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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27197795">The Full Monty</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheGrayGoose/pseuds/TheGrayGoose'>TheGrayGoose</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>A Song of Ice and Fire &amp; Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Bisexual Jon Snow, Bran is an annoying little twerp (but who wasn't at 19 years old), But the boots are high-heeled and FABULOUS, But this time Sam has his shit together and Jon is the loser, Gilly was raised by Aemon, I made Rhaegar a Reds fan because he deserves to be unhappy, Inheritance Issues, Jon and Sam are still best friends, Jon is trying to pull himself up by his bootstraps, Multi, Ned should've made a will, Nurse Sansa, POV Multiple, Past Edd Tollett/Fat Walda Frey, Past Jon Snow/Ygritte, Past Melessa Florent Tarly/Randyll Tarly, Personal Trainer Arya, Stripper AU, The Full Monty AU, Unspecified Midwestern setting, Veterinary Student Gilly, pure self-indulgence, unemployment</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-10-25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-03-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 17:09:04</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>7</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>31,156</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27197795</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheGrayGoose/pseuds/TheGrayGoose</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Jon Snow is having a bad time. His girlfriend Ygritte kicked him out, he has to share a crappy college apartment with his cousins Bran and Rickon, and to top it all off, he just lost his job at Night's Watch Security. His best friend Sam Tarly is also having a bad time. After losing his own job, he can't afford to send his wife Gilly back to veterinary school, his father Randyll's remarriage to a MUCH younger woman is the talk of the town, and his mother has just discovered the joys of Tinder. But after Gilly attends a wild bachelorette party, Jon hatches an idea to make a quick buck: stripping!<br/>Along with their old boss Alliser Thorne, IT consultant Edd, and Arya's client Satin, the two friends began practicing their dance moves and drumming up local interest in their show. But can Sam overcome his shyness and rekindle the spark with Gilly? Will Jon patch things up with Ygritte, or pursue a new love? And will our five reluctant dancers truly be willing to bare the full monty when the time comes?</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Gilly/Samwell Tarly, Melessa Florent Tarly/Alliser Thorne, Osha/Hodor, Sansa Stark/Edd Tollett, Satin Flowers/Jon Snow</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>10</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Jon I</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>There was a fucking banana in his locker. Jon remembered it as soon as he stepped into the break room, perfumed by a rank sweetness emanating from the corner where he and Sam kept their things. He should have known better. Once he’d left his lunch in there accidentally, in a mad dash to get his uniform on and join Sam on the cart before Mr. Thorne noticed their tardiness and docked them any pay—because he could, and would, cut into their paychecks if they were even thirty seconds late to work. The smell had permeated his hoodie so that for a week afterwards he’d gotten a whiff of roast beef and stale bread every time he moved. He’d learned his lesson after that, and eaten in the break room before his shift started. But the one time, the <em>one time</em>, he’d left food in his locker after that was the day he’d been fired. Him and Sam both, out on their asses, blinking stupidly in the bright afternoon light outside the Night’s Watch Security building. The whole thing had taken less than five minutes—<em>together</em>. Mr. Thorne hadn’t even given them the courtesy of separate exit interviews. He’d simply asked them to step into his office when they arrived for work, gruff as you please, but then he was always gruff. Only when they stepped inside and found the HR director behind Mr. Thorne’s desk did he realize what was happening.</p><p>Outside on the pavement, Sam had looked as dazed as he felt. “Did that really just happen?” he asked, chin quivering as it always did when something life-changing occurred and he hadn’t processed it yet. Jon hadn’t seen that quiver since he rode in the ambulance with Sam after his injury. But it <em>had</em> happened, and they went to the bar and drowned their sorrows until Sam’s wife Gilly came to pick them up after work, some six hours later. Sam was barely ambulatory by then; Jon, less so. He didn’t remember anything after her storming into the bar and ordering them into the van, except Sam singing along to the radio, tuneless. Oh, and the next morning he’d woken to find a box full of his possessions in the front hall of Ygritte’s condo, and a note telling him to get out. He remembered that.</p><p>In the ensuing turmoil of moving out of his girlfriend's place and into his cousins', and attending hopeful hearings about Uncle Ned’s will, Jon hadn’t thought to go back for his things until he missed his hat. It was a beat-up old thing, sweat-stained and faded with the Reds logo peeling off on one side, but it had been his dad’s. The Reds were as disappointing as always, so Jon only wore it to cut the grass at Uncle Ned’s and Aunt Cat’s, and it was a week before he realized it was missing. That day he’d been forced to mow their vast lawn in one of his cousin Bran’s hats, a beglittered baseball cap with a rainbow on the bill that gleefully proclaimed “Make America GAY Again!” Bran wasn’t gay—"Pansexual is probably closest to what I feel, but I don’t like to label myself,” he had explained earnestly—but he thought the cap was hilarious and wore it as often as possible. Jon was less amused, especially when Arya snuck a picture of him in it, sweaty and tired-looking, and sent it to Ygritte with the caption “I think Jon has something to tell you…”</p><p>It transpired that Sam had also left some personal things behind in his locker, so he agreed to go with Jon to Night’s Watch Security on the weekend and see if their keys still worked. By some miracle they did; he suspected the people responsible for locking them out of the system had been laid off themselves. In further confirmation of his suspicions, they found their lockers surrounded by an ominous cloud of fruit flies but otherwise undisturbed.</p><p>Grimacing, Sam gestured at the cloud, which seemed to be gathering strength and menace as they dallied. “Any idea what that’s about?”</p><p>“No clue,” Jon lied. A vague recollection of Sansa sneaking a banana into the plastic grocery bag that served as his lunchbox surfaced. Before her interference it had contained a can of Arizona Iced Tea and a bag of microwave popcorn still in its plastic sleeve, which would <em>not</em> have stunk up his locker. “Even <em>you</em> need to eat real food sometimes, Jon,” she had mocked in the sing-song voice she got whenever she was repeating some notion of Aunt Cat’s. Naturally, he’d eaten the popcorn and shoved everything else to the back of his locker with a silent promise to trade it to Sam later. Little did he know that before he could, they’d both be fired, the company shut down, and the air conditioning to the building turned off in the middle of July, baking whatever horror dwelt inside his locker in the Midwestern sun for a full seven days.</p><p>“Well it’s not mine. I never leave any of my lunch.” Sam looked at him, hopeful. Jon knew that look. It meant “I don’t want to do this, and you owe me, so…”</p><p>“Oh for fuck’s sake, I’ll do it, just be ready with the trash can.” Jon pulled his shirt over his nose and flung open the locker door.</p><p>The stench that assaulted his nostrils was biblical, but it was nothing compared to the <em>flies</em>. They poured out of his locker like the blood from the elevator in that famous scene from <em>The Shining</em>. Jon thought that if Jack Nicholson had dealt with this smell, the ensuing murder spree was understandable. “<em>God!</em>” he rasped, nearly retching, and turned his face away. Wordlessly, Sam handed him a roll of paper towels. Jon wound his hand in a protective layer, as if wrapping a wounded limb in medical gauze, and groped blindly in his locker. He felt a pile of mush. Trying not to conjure a vivid mental picture of the rotten fruit, he seized a handful and threw it in the direction of the trash can.</p><p>It landed with a satisfying <em>splat</em> against the side of the plastic can, but busting the fruit open only made the smell worse. Feeling his gorge rise in his throat, Jon stumbled to the window and flung it open, gulping down great deep breaths of fresh air. The July air was heavy and hot, but mercifully free of the odor of rotten banana.</p><p>When he no longer felt he might vomit, he turned around to find Sam dutifully cleaning out the rest of the stodgy mess. “How can you stand the smell?!” he gasped, flinging an arm over his face.</p><p>Sam shrugged. “I have a five-year-old?”</p><p>He had to laugh. “Remind me never to have kids.”</p><p>“Last week little Sam spilled a cup of applesauce in his toybox and didn’t tell anyone about it. It was three days before Mom and Gilly found it. You should’ve seen them, they were like bloodhounds, sniffing it out.” He paused. “Want to put this mess in Mr. Thorne’s office?”</p><p>To Jon’s glee, Mr. Thorne’s office was also unlocked. They wheeled the trash can inside and left it directly under an east-facing window. After a brief internal debate over whether to shit in his desk drawer—he opted for a regretful “no”—he followed Sam out, tip-toing to the door like a child up past his bedtime and closed the door with a soft <em>snick.</em><br/><br/></p><p>In the car they were both giddy. “I wish we’d done that <em>years</em> ago,” Sam confessed as they peeled out of the parking lot. “He deserves all that and more. Chucking us out the way he did… I’d worked there <em>six years</em>, Jon! Practically since I graduated. And he didn’t even offer to give me a reference.”</p><p>“Maybe I should’ve shit in his desk after all,” Jon said with a wry smile. Sam did deserve better than that, but himself and Mr. Thorne had always butted heads. He wasn’t at all surprised that his tenure at Night’s Watch Security ended the way it did.</p><p>“What? You totally should’ve! I didn’t know you were thinking it.” Sam let out a sudden bark of a laugh and smacked the steering wheel. “Is it too late to go back, do you think?”</p><p>He chuckled. “Maybe it’s for the best, he’d probably consider it biological warfare and call the CDC.”</p><p>“No, he’d jump straight to phoning the police,” Sam chuckled, but Jon could tell his mind was already elsewhere. His friend’s eyes flickered to the dashboard, checking the time. 5:37. Not enough time to drop him off and still get home before dinner.</p><p>“Bran can pick me up from your house after class,” he offered, sensing Sam’s dilemma. “Or I can call an Uber, if you want.” Before, when he and Ygritte were still together—not that they <em>weren’t</em> together now, things were just… complicated—they were often asked to dinner at Sam and Gilly’s. He’d been a frequent solo dinner guest even before they’d gotten together, in the early years of Sam and Gilly’s marriage. But in the last few months, the casual invitations had dried up, then ceased. He hadn’t yet decided if he should be insulted, or if the couple was just trying to budget by not feeding their stray friends.</p><p>“What? Oh no, that’s ok, you can hang out for a while.” His eyes flicked back to the road, where traffic threatened to jam. “It’s just Gilly has a bachelorette party tonight. She needs the car.”</p><p>“Oh yeah?” he asked, grinning. “Who’s the lucky lady?” The childish playfulness he’d felt at sabotaging Mr. Thorne’s office hadn’t entirely worn off yet. The air was just starting to cool, it promised to be a gorgeous evening, and if he played his cards right, he might be in for a pleasant night of pizza and baseball with the Sams instead of listening to another one of Bran’s droning lectures about the problematic nature of professional sports.</p><p>“Osha, actually,” Sam gossiped with a smile. “Can you believe it?”</p><p>“You’re shitting me! Osha??” Jon gaped, aghast. Osha had been on the very edge of Jon’s orbit in college, one of Gilly’s co-workers who turned up sporadically at house parties with crazy Nordic liquors no one had heard of. He remembered her as an absolute madwoman. “She’s getting married? To who?”</p><p>“Some DJ, I met him once or twice when they started dating. He’s <em>huge</em>, seven feet tall or something, has a stupid beard.”</p><p>“Huh.” A DJ sounded tame, for Osha. “Are you sure he’s not a wandering yogi in his spare time? Or a snake charmer, or…” he groped for something ridiculous, “a, a vegan survivalist, or something?”</p><p>“What the hell is a vegan survivalist?” Sam asked, some of his worry melting away with his curiosity.</p><p>“I guess… a doomsday prepper, but he only stockpiles lentils and tofu?”</p><p>“And his bomb shelter is made out of mud and grass,” Sam suggested.</p><p>“And instead of guns, he protects himself with cabbage farts.” They both cackled.</p><p>“No, I don’t think Hodor is anything like that,” Sam answered when he’d stopped laughing. “Pretty normal guy, actually, except for how tall he is. I’ll tell him you thought he was a snake charmer, he’ll enjoy that.”</p><p>They pulled into Sam’s driveway, still trading jabs about Osha’s future of lentils and organic farming. Little Sam was playing in the sprinkler, clad in red swim trunks and—for some reason—water wings. Sam’s mother sat smoking on the porch, watching him with a faint smile. “Evening Mrs. Tarly,” he called as he got out of the car. “Hi Sam.”</p><p>“Jon!” Little Sam raced over and gave his leg a joyful and very wet hug.</p><p>“What a nice surprise!” Mrs. Tarly rose from her porch swing, hand crooked over her brow to shade her eyes from the evening light. “How’s the family?”</p><p>“Good,” he said, with an easy smile. “Same old, same old. Arya’s just gone full time at her job, and Rickon’s about to start college in the fall.”</p><p>She sighed, face sagging. “Already? I remember when he was the size of Little Sam… They grow like weeds.”</p><p>“But somehow you stay the same age,” Jon cracked, and hugged her. As he did, he realized that he hadn’t had a hug since... well, Uncle Ned’s funeral, probably. A wave of unexpected emotion washed over him. Rather than say anything more, he pushed the screen door open and ushered Mrs. Tarly inside, the Sams following in her wake.</p><p>The front room was a riot of toys and laundry, with that odor of plastic and Kool-aid peculiar to the homes of people with young children. He breathed deep and smiled, contented. It felt like home, even more than the townhouse he’d shared with Ygritte. <em>Much</em> more than the shitty apartment he now shared with Bran and Rickon.</p><p>“Sorry about the mess,” Sam said ruefully, misinterpreting his silence. “It’s been crazy this week, Gilly’s had overtime at work…”</p><p>“Hey, it’s no worse than my cousins,” he offered. “Rickon leaves toys all over, too, just different ones. Sat on a mic stand yesterday.”</p><p>“Jon, dear, do you want something to eat?” Mrs. Tarly called from somewhere within the depths of the house. “We have casserole!”</p><p>“She never asks if <em>I</em> want something to eat,” Sam muttered.</p><p>“I’m fine, thanks!” he yelled back. More quietly, to Sam, he said, “Should I go? I don’t want to intrude on family time.” That should give him an out, if he truly was worried about their budget.</p><p>“Don’t, I think Mom’s going out soon too,” Sam said. Unable to resist the siren song of casserole, his son ran off to his grandma, leaving them alone in the front room. “She has a Tinder date. <em>Tinder! </em>Dickon’s convinced she’s going to be murdered. I had no idea she even knew what Tinder <em>was</em>.”</p><p>Oh god! Jon used Tinder. Just… browsing, while Ygritte came to her senses. He’d set his upper age limit at 40, but if Mrs. Tarly lied about her age… the prospect of seeing his friend’s mother’s face pop up in his matches was not an idea he wanted to explore. And if she could see his <em>other</em> preferences… maybe he should adjust the age downward a bit more.</p><p>Just then, Gilly emerged from the back bedroom, adjusting her earrings. She was certainly dressed for a night out; a shimmery black high-necked top that showed off her toned arms, her most flattering jeans, and a pair of strappy heels. He didn’t think he’d seen her in heels and jewelry since Grenn’s wedding. He wolf-whistled. “Gills, you look great! You’re not on the prowl for husband number two, are you?” It was meant in jest, but he did not miss Sam’s sudden scowl. <em>What’s that about? </em>he wondered, shocked. Everyone knew Gilly was devoted to him. To suggest otherwise was too ridiculous to take seriously.</p><p>In contrast to her husband, Gilly beamed. “You think so? It’s been so long since I got dressed up, I wasn’t sure my clothes would still fit. I’ve had this top since… God, I can’t remember.”</p><p>“I remember,” Sam said sullenly. “You wore it to our engagement party.”</p><p>“Did I?” Gilly sounded distracted. “I’m sure you’re right.” She leaned in for a hug from Jon, still fiddling with her earrings. “Dinner’s on the stove, it’s the breakfast casserole you like. There’s a bowl of salad in the fridge. Sam shouldn’t need a bath, he played in the sprinkler, so you just need to put him to bed. Don’t wait up!” With a flourish she kissed Sam on the cheek, grabbed her purse, and sashayed out the door.</p><p>“Everything ok?” he asked Sam once he heard the car start up in the driveway.</p><p>“It’s fine,” his friend muttered. “I hate that casserole. It’s Little Sam who likes it, not me.”</p><p>Jon was starting to get a distinct feeling of discomfort, not at all what he wanted to feel on a lazy summer Friday. <em>Can’t I have ONE place where I can relax? </em>“So… pizza?”</p><p> </p><p>Sam revived over cheese and pepperoni, as Jon knew he would. By the fifth inning he was positively chatty. They’d abused Thorne more thoroughly—with child-appropriate restraint until little Sam’s bedtime, then with more vigor. Sam wondered how his mother was doing on her date, half worried that she was being chopped into pieces as they spoke, and perhaps <em>more</em> worried that she was enjoying herself. In time, they returned to the ripe subject of weddings and, more importantly, bachelorettes. “The thing about Gilly and bachelorette parties,” he exposited between gulps of pizza, “is that she always comes home in the middle of the night, tipsy and, ah, <em>in the mood for love</em>, should I say?” His face flushed. “Not that it isn’t nice, but don’t wake me in the middle of the night for anything short of the house burning down! I told her that after Karsi’s. Didn’t go over well.”</p><p>“I wonder why,” Jon teased, but he understood. Things with Ygritte had cooled, too, before he moved out. The sex, when it happened, was as good as ever, but it came less often and at prescribed times. He couldn’t even put the blame on her; just as often, he’d pretended to be asleep when she came to bed, out of preoccupation, or anger, or just sheer exhaustion. But just as sure as he knew he and Ygritte would work things out, he knew Sam and Gilly were immune to all of the foibles and misunderstandings of lesser couples. They were perfect together! He had never met two other people who melded together so seamlessly. “Tell her to save it for morning next time.”</p><p>His friend heaved a heavy sigh and stared into his beer—the cheap kind, Jon noticed, not something nice from the brewery down the road. “Well, she’s always gone by the time I get Sam up and around, isn’t she?” he muttered, almost to himself. “And when she gets off work, Mom is here.”</p><p>The frustrated I-am-a-third-wheel feeling that he’d had earlier came back, accompanied by a surge of irritation. It had been a tough afternoon for them both. If he wanted to hear complaints, he’d go home and spend time with Bran. Sam never stayed down for long, but even after years of friendship Jon could never tell what might set him off to grow pensive and withdrawn. If he only knew, he’d make a joke and head him off, but there seemed to be more and more triggers now.</p><p>The crinkling of a beer can made them both jump. Faint surprise registered on Sam’s face as he stared down at his crumpled drink. “Ignore me, it’s just the bachelorette party. I always worry when she goes out by herself.”</p><p>“She’s got friends with her,” Jon chided. “And she doesn’t get falling-down drunk, she’s too responsible.”</p><p>“Yeah, but…” He leaned in and said in a conspiratorial tone, “They’re going to see strippers.”</p><p>His eyebrows shot up before he could stop them. “Male or female?” With Osha, one never knew. Once he’d seen her leaving a party with a man’s arm around her waist and a woman attached to her face. He hadn’t hidden his surprise quick enough and she’d shouted after him as he darted past, “I’m an equal opportunity employer, asshole!”</p><p>“Male,” Sam whined, lip poking out. The resemblance to Little Sam suddenly became apparent.</p><p>“And you’re ok with that?”</p><p>“Does it matter?” They watched in silence as the Reds struck out again. A reporter came on to interview an injured player, grim with resignation. Commercials. Jon considered getting another beer.</p><p>“I mean, it’s not like it was Gilly’s idea,” Sam said, resuming the conversation as if there had been no interruption. “You know how Osha gets, and Karsi eggs her on. She’s probably uncomfortable.” He finally dared a glance at Jon. “Think I should text, check on her?”</p><p>That sounded like something Ygritte would’ve hated. <em>Would still hate.</em> “Probably not until it gets late,” he suggested, trying his best to sound bright and cheerful. “It’s only nine. They’re probably still at the bar.”</p><p>“No, I think they were doing the strippers first.” Jon ignored the slip of the tongue and kept his eyes focused on the TV, now advertising NFL Sunday Ticket. As long as he didn’t look over at Sam, he couldn’t be <em>sure</em> he was stewing.</p><p> </p><p>Gilly was still out with the girls when the game was over, but Jon had had enough. He and Sam had not exchanged two more sentences after their conversation about strippers, and the atmosphere grew steadily more uncomfortable as the game wound to its inevitable end. Not a moment too soon—Jon had been thinking of excuses to leave for the past half hour. The wait for his Uber was interminable.</p><p>“My ride’s almost here.” He breathed a sigh of relief. “Two more minutes.”</p><p>“What are we looking for?” Sam asked, accompanying him outside to wait. The porch light flicked on and moths began circling. They looked like the much older cousins of the fruit flies buzzing around their lockers that afternoon. He smiled, remembering, and felt a pinprick of guilt. <em>You wouldn’t be too happy if Ygritte was off watching strippers, either. </em></p><p>“A silver Toyota Camry.”</p><p>“Ok.”</p><p>A moth battered itself against the screen door, seeking light and heat.</p><p>“Sam—”</p><p>“Jon—”</p><p>They smiled together, embarrassed. “Sam, I’m sure Gilly’s just causing a spectacle with her girlfriends and, like, wearing an inflatable penis hat or something. She’s a good woman. She’d never do anything to hurt you.”</p><p>“I know.” Sam sighed again, and words came pouring forth as if he’d sprung a leak. “I know she’d never, you know, cheat. It’s not that. But you saw her earlier, she was so… <em>sparkly</em>, and happy. She was like the girl I met in college again. I haven’t seen her like that for a long time.” At that moment the Toyota rounded the corner, the yellow cone of the headlights expanding as it neared the house. <em>Why did he wait until my Uber was here to say all this?</em></p><p>“She’s just happy for her friend. Remember Grenn’s bachelor party? We were both crazy excited for that, and it didn’t mean we loved our partners any less.”</p><p>“Yeah.” The Uber honked. “Well, at least she doesn’t have a lot of money to tip, eh?”</p><p> </p><p>His driver, a bored girl who <em>might</em> have been one of Rickon’s school friends, wasn’t in the mood to chat, and neither was he. She greeted Jon and turned up the volume of whatever noise she’d been listening to. The wind from the open window drowned it out nicely. He thought of Gilly and her friends, giggling and side-eying strippers while the bachelorette roared with approval. He tried not to imagine Ygritte at the table next to them. Would she do that? Could he rightly be upset if she did? Maybe he hadn’t always been as patient as he should have been, argued a little too often… but that didn’t justify throwing him out. He refused to believe it was the job loss alone that had been the final straw. Ygritte wasn’t that shallow.</p><p> </p><p>At home, Bran was entrenched on the couch. One hand pawed at a plate of congealing pizza rolls, while the other jabbed speedily at his phone. The whole room reeked of boys. Suddenly he longed for one of the “Driftwood and Sea Salt” candles Ygritte used to burn in the bathroom. He used to call them silly.</p><p>“Done worshipping at the altar of the God of Sport?”</p><p>He sighed. “Hey, Bran.” His cousin didn’t approve of professional sports, or indeed athletics at the college level. “Takes much-needed funding away from music and the arts,” he would opine whenever the topic was raised, blithely assuming everyone agreed that music and arts were superior.</p><p>Bran studied him, pizza roll halfway to his mouth. “Bad night?”</p><p>Maybe he was in the mood to be magnanimous. “To put it lightly, yeah.”</p><p>“Did your beloved—wait, what sport is going on right now?”</p><p>He sighed again. “Baseball, Bran, you know that. You <em>played</em> baseball for years.” That earned him a glare. “And it’s not that, Sam and Gilly are having ‘marital difficulties’, and I didn’t know until I went over there and got in the middle of it. I feel like I need a shower.”</p><p>“Oh, they’ll be fine,” he muttered, waving a vague hand. “It’s hard on any couple, when someone experiences a job loss.”</p><p>“Yeah, because you know so much about job losses. And relationships.” Bran absorbed a glare of his own, then.</p><p>Instantly he felt stupid and childish. <em>You’re arguing with a teenager. Even if you win, you’re still a loser.</em> “Sorry. Truce?” he offered hopefully, and after a moment’s consideration, Bran nodded and returned his attention to the television. There would be no more said on that topic, and no interminable in-between time where they had both apologized but were still pissed at each other. It was one of the things Jon liked most about his cousin.</p><p>"No plans tonight?” he ventured. It looked like they were both preparing for a night in. A bottle of the finest, cheapest red wine Kroger had to offer was open on the coffee table, and Bran was wearing Aunt Cat’s ratty old fuzzy slippers.</p><p>“There’s not anyone around worth seeing,” he answered, striking a dramatic pose on the sofa as if it were a fainting couch. He would look almost Wildean if not for the crumbs on his chest.</p><p>“What happened to Tommen?”</p><p>“Bad conversationalist.” Jon suppressed a snort. Bran was the only college boy he knew who cared about the quality of a crush’s conversation. “I tried his sister Myrcella after that. She was much more captivating, you know, very witty, but <em>most</em> unfortunately she is taken. So now I’m watching TV.”</p><p>“Rickon?”</p><p>“On a date.” In contrast to Bran, whose romantic obsessions lasted about as long as a bag of pizza rolls, his youngest cousin had dated Shireen Baratheon since the tenth grade. Before Ned died, she had turned up at Stark family dinner as often as Jon and rather more often than Arya. He realized it might not be long before Shireen had a bachelorette party of her own. The pizza churned in his stomach, and he wanted to sit down. He checked the couch—no mic stands this time.</p><p>“Bran? What do you think of strippers?”</p><p>His cousin considered. “Male or female?”</p><p>Jon wanted to laugh. Maybe they weren’t so different. “Either.”</p><p>“They’re excellent.”</p><p>That did make him laugh. “Have you ever even been to a strip club??”</p><p>“No, totally déclassé. The working conditions those women have to put up with…” He shook his head sadly. “One time I saw this girl Tyene do a striptease at a party, though…”</p><p>Jon had reached his threshold for hearing about other people’s love lives. He bid his cousin a good night and headed to bed. <em>It’s eleven o’clock on a Friday night, and I’m going to bed alone. </em>Had he killed someone in a previous life?</p><p>Before he turned out the light, he checked his phone for texts from Ygritte. Sometimes she would send something mean if she drank. More often, she would send a “hey” or a “You up?” if she was feeling friendly. Tonight, there was nothing.</p><p>But sleep wouldn’t come. He was still awake when Bran went off to his own bedroom around midnight, tunelessly humming the jingle for a local car dealership as he brushed his teeth. He was still awake when Rickon and Shireen stumbled in around two, still awake as they fooled around in the next room. Jon pulled his blanket over his head and thanked every deity he could think of that they were quieter than Bran and Tommen had been. He was even still awake when Shireen tiptoed to the bathroom at 2:30.</p><p>At last he gave in and decided he wasn’t getting any sleep that night. Why not lie in bed until noon, anyway? His cousins would. Maybe Shireen would make breakfast—her pancakes were even better than Aunt Cat’s. After a moment’s consideration, he texted Sam.</p><p>“You up?” <em>Jesus Christ Jon, it sounds like you’re looking for a hookup.</em></p><p>“Yep. Gilly’s not home”</p><p>He glanced at the clock—almost three. “Is she ok??”</p><p>“I think so, I’ve been checking in every half hour. Her last text was ‘alMOST DONE Karsi is caslhing oout OMG PARTYY IN THEW UWSAAA~’. Verbatim”</p><p>Jon chuckled. Gilly <em>loved</em> Miley when she was drunk. “Let her have her fun. Who’s DDing?”</p><p>“Hodor is picking them up”</p><p>“Give her a kiss from me 😘 And don’t kick her out of bed!”</p><p>“You wish”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I'm sorry for bringing this into the world. Enjoy!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Gilly I</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Gilly gets a little wild at Osha's bachelorette party.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The line for the club was as narrow and twisty as a snake, and moved almost as fast. Gilly checked her phone—10 o’clock. Little Sam should be sleeping by now, but sometimes Sam forgot to put him down on time when Jon was over… should she check? Maybe she should text Melessa—wait, no, she had a date. She’d told Gilly all about it this afternoon, vibrating with energy, as they tried on their sparkly going-out clothes and put on a mini fashion show in the living room for Little Sam. “His name’s Oberyn,” she gushed, prancing around like a girl in a flirty little black dress. “He’s a professor who does marathons and he’s absolutely <em>gorgeous</em>, Gilly. Much better looking than Randyll. He’s not the only one who can find something a bit younger.” Melessa had resisted all her daughter’s attempts to get her to join Tinder… until Randyll and Margaery announced their engagement. Then, she’d taken to it like a house on fire. Oberyn was the first man she’d actually agreed to meet.</p><p>“How much younger?” she had asked, warily.</p><p>“Forty-five, I think.” She did a final twirl and looked to little Sam for approval. “You like?”</p><p>“You look pretty, gam-gam.” Her son beamed toothlessly.</p><p>“Well if my little man thinks so…” Melessa scooped him up and planted a kiss on his face, then another as Sam giggled. “He’s expecting his own grandchild any day now,” she confided to Gilly as she set him back down.</p><p>“Oh, that’s nice,” she agreed, still a bit worried. “Forty-five, you said?”</p><p>“Girl, I’m only forty-two on my profile.”</p><p>Now, as she stood in front of the club with Karsi and Osha, she wondered if they were both kidding themselves. Melessa could keep up with a younger man on an intellectual level, but she was often nodding in her armchair before the evening news came on. And marathons? Somehow Gilly couldn’t see her lacing up her sneakers for a morning couple’s jog. No, Melessa was putting on a brave face. She gave a little shudder and thanked her lucky stars that she’d found her own soulmate at 21. Yes, it was a struggle to raise their son on one income, and yes, things between them weren’t so good since they had to move in with his mother, who could be difficult at times even though Gilly loved her—but she and Sam were ok, really, weren’t they? One couldn’t expect a lot of spice in a relationship once one had been married for five years.</p><p>Osha, ever the commitment-phobe, was already having jitters about becoming a Boring Old Married Lady the instant she and Hodor said “I do.” It was this pathological fear that made her give up on Grenn, when they had dated, and Tormund after him, and Yara after <em>him</em>. Good people, all of them; they had made Osha happy, for a little while at least. But the smallest hint of joining their lives and she had scampered away, gleefully flinging herself into the arms of the next attractive person who came along. Grenn had asked to move in, she remembered. Tormund wanted kids. She didn’t recall what Yara’s crime had been. Something about a gym membership?</p><p>“Hey. Hey you, fishface. You in there?” Karsi snapped her fingers in front of Gilly’s face. “Line’s moving.”</p><p>“Oh—sorry, I was miles away,” Gilly confessed, flushing red. Her best friend only used her childhood nickname when she was annoyed, and when Karsi was annoyed, a smart woman patched it up with her as soon as possible. “I was just worrying about—”</p><p>“Little Sam, we know, we know,” Osha intoned, rolling her eyes. “You know I love your little monster with all my heart, and I think he is the most adorable child ever to walk the earth—excepting your daughters, Karsi—”</p><p>“Noted,” Karsi agreed.</p><p>“—but can you give it a rest for <em>one night??</em> He does have a father, you know, who can occasionally be trusted to take care of him. I’m sure Sam would call you if he’d, I don’t know, gotten into the knives or something—”</p><p>“<em>Osha</em>,” scolded Karsi. “Don’t say that. Little Sam is much more likely to pull furniture over onto himself at his age.” The pair of women in front of them glanced over their shoulders with matching expressions of pure horror.</p><p>Gilly took it in stride. “Actually I was thinking of Melessa,” she admitted, as their line partners began a furious whispered conversation with each other. “She has a Tinder date. He seems very, well, <em>freewheeling.</em> I wouldn’t be surprised if we ran into them here.”</p><p>“<em>Here??</em>” The queue had moved so they stood directly under the marquee, which read “HARD COCK LIFE – 7/25” in foot-high red letters, between “They Might Be Giants 7/18” and “Gay Puppet Show 7/26.” Gilly thought it looked curiously innocuous to be advertising something so torrid, like a movie theater listing. The scrolling electronic byline of “DICKS DICKS DICKS!” was more eye-catching; the establishment had sprung for rainbow lettering and an animation of exploding bombs.</p><p>“Well, maybe not <em>here</em>,” she admitted. “But when we go out after. Oooh, can you imagine, running into your mother-in-law at a bachelorette party?”</p><p>“She’s welcome to join us,” shrugged Osha. “And her date.”</p><p> </p><p>After the opening act—a group of men in short shorts and nothing else who performed roller skating tricks, for some reason—they hit the bathroom to freshen up. By then, she’d had reassurance from Sam that their son was safe in bed, and from Melessa that she was having a fabulous time on her date and was <em>not</em> being murdered. Still, she dutifully sent the picture of Oberyn’s license plate that Gilly had insisted upon. In the picture she was perched on the back of a motorcycle, smiling through clenched teeth. Gilly let out a low whistle.</p><p>“What’s up?” asked Karsi, dabbing at her lashes with a mascara wand. “Something wrong at home?”</p><p>“No—Sam’s mom’s date has a motorcycle, she just sent me a picture. Well, she won’t be going out with him again.” Many times Gilly had endured rants about the recklessness and irresponsibility of cyclists while trapped in the car with Sam’s mother. She was shocked Oberyn had even gotten her to sit on the thing—he must be <em>really</em> handsome.</p><p>“Ooooh, hot.” Her friends crowded around and Osha seized the phone. “Aw, isn’t she cute! Looks like she’s about to shit herself in fear, though.”</p><p>Gilly shook her head. “She’s really uncomfortable. I hope he’s not pressuring her to do something she doesn’t want.”</p><p>“Oh, she could use a little discomfort,” Osha replied breezily. “How will you find what you like if you never try anything new? Hodor was uncomfortable with the ball gag at first, but after a few times he—”</p><p>The opening bars of Macho Man thudded through the room, signaling the beginning of the show. Squeals of delight erupted around them. Soon the room emptied, leaving Gilly and her friends to wait amidst the fug of cigarette smoke and scented body lotion for the single stall to open—one toilet had flooded, and the other was occupied by a woman who was alternating between bouts of noisy crying and drunken mumbling about a “scarlet whore-beast.”</p><p>“Jesus Christ, this woman,” pouted Karsi, who had taken out $20 in singles from the bank just for this event. “We’re not going to get a good seat! Let’s just hold it and come back later.”</p><p>Osha didn’t look convinced. She hopped from foot to foot, peering into the one working stall with impatience. <em>She looks like Little Sam doing his pee-pee dance, </em>Gilly thought, and stifled a giggle. “This is stupid,” her friend growled, and banged on the door. The woman inside let out a wail and banged back. “Fuck it, I’m going to the men’s room.”</p><p>There was no line outside of it, but still Gilly hesitated at the threshold. “Oshaaa, let’s just go,” she whined. “What if there’s someone in there?”</p><p>“Only one way to find out.” Osha rapped on the door. “HEY! Everyone decent? Man-tackle under wraps?”</p><p>No response. One of the bouncers was keeping an eye on them both, now, with an expression that said they were one wrong move away from him strolling over and telling them to move along. “Come <em>on</em>,” she hissed, “You’ll get us kicked out!”</p><p>“Live a little.” Osha flashed her a wicked grin and thrust the mens’ room door open.</p><p>Thank god there were no men inside. No stalls, either, just a line of urinals set into the floor against one wall. “Bad luck,” Karsi said with a cluck of her tongue. “Can’t you hold it? I don’t want to miss anything! I <em>put on makeup</em> for this, Osha!”</p><p>“Oh, <em>fine</em>, if you’re both going to be pussies about it!” Gilly looked on, slack-jawed, as Osha yanked down her panties and staggered over to the urinal. With remarkable precision, considering how much pre-gaming she had done that afternoon, Osha hit the urinal with the first stream of piss.</p><p>“Bravo!!” yelped Karsi, applauding. Gilly covered her face with her purse.</p><p> </p><p><em>So. Much. Gyrating.</em> Gilly’s own body hurt, and all she’d done was sit in a chair and—<em>once</em>, after a shot of tequila and much encouragement—tucked a single into the stripper’s… g-string? Thong? She wasn’t sure of the difference. Her only point of reference for banana hammocks was Phoebe’s assumed name on <em>Friends</em>. Her own lacy things were brought out once or twice a year, for anniversaries or Sam’s birthday, and most of those were… well. Older than she cared to think about.</p><p>She supposed the show had been fun, in an obvious and tawdry sort of way, but still she breathed a sigh of relief when it was over. At least none of the strippers had approached her individually to wave their bits in her face. Those in the first row had not been so lucky. She and Karsi tiptoed once to the stage to tip the entertainment, her face flaming, but that was as close as she’d gotten. And just as well. She couldn’t imagine how some of the other women could be so aggressive, yelling things that made her blush and grabbing at the men’s packages. It was hypocritical, really, she thought. If the genders were reversed, a lot of those women would have cried harassment, but if <em>they</em> did it…</p><p>Still. As much as the men’s painted-on leers and feigned enjoyment dismayed her, there was something about the raw sexual energy they exuded that made her, well, <em>excited.</em> During the show she’d felt a wicked little thrill at watching such toned, fit, confident men dance and contort themselves for her pleasure. It had been a LONG time since Sam had taken any trouble to wind her up properly. Oh, he did what he needed to in bed (whenever they made it there,) but there was just something <em>missing</em> lately. She didn’t think it was his physique—the male strippers kind of frightened her, actually, they had to be using steroids or something. She preferred her husband’s cuddliness. Just <em>something</em>…</p><p>As they walked down the street to catch their Uber, Osha opined loudly that the strippers had <em>nothing</em> on her Hodor, the most cheering endorsement of her upcoming wedding Gilly had heard from her all night. Karsi giggled that she was going to give her own husband Halder a nice time when she got home. “You too Gilly, you and Sam need to catch up with us! Little Sam’s four, five now? Time for another!”</p><p>The prospect of more children sobered her right up. “Oh, Sam will get a midnight visit from me… but nothing that makes babies,” she said gamely. Her friends howled.</p><p>The night fuzzed around the edges. Toasts were lifted to Osha’s fiancé and their own husbands, and Melessa’s date, and many other things she forgot after the next drink. They ordered syrupy cocktails and shots named after sex acts and once even some concoction the bartender lit on fire—she sent that one back. They danced themselves breathless and played half-remembered drinking games from college and stirred their drinks with straws shaped like male genitalia. When men came around, asking for dances or numbers, Osha sent them all away with a kiss. “Hodor won’t mind,” she assured them. “Girls give him kisses all the time when he DJ’s.” She had outright refused to wear an “I’m the Bride” sash or T-shirt, but accepted a cheap plastic tiara with a veil attached when the bartender told her it was on the house. “Free is free,” she cheered, and jammed it onto her head. Now one side sagged, forgotten, over her brow. Someone had stuck a peeled-off beer label to the back of her veil. <em>When did that happen? </em>She was hunched over her drink, surveying the rest of the room with one restless eye while Karsi nattered on next to them about the relative merits of *NSync versus BTS. Gilly knew that look. It meant something reckless, possibly of questionable legality, was coming, and either she or Karsi should get out of the way in case they had to bail Osha out of trouble later. “I’m going to the restroom,” she blurted out and hurried away, sliding a little on a spilled drink.</p><p>Thankfully, there was no flooded toilet here, and she had to wait only a short time before she could enclose herself in a stall. Gilly sank down and dropped her head into her hands. <em>Ohhh I’m in trouble,</em> she thought miserably. She’d felt only a little tipsy at the table with her friends, but the simple act of standing had tilted the world off its axis. Her face was sweaty and cold at the same time. <em>It’s not so bad,</em> she told herself, <em>I can still come back from this if I drink some water, </em>and stared at the floor until the tiles stopped shifting around like a game of Tetris.</p><p>While she waited in the cool dim of her stall for her balance to return, life went on in front of the mirror. Girls who’d still been in braces when Gilly went to her first bar were gossiping, swapping lipsticks, comparing their prospects. Ten years ago she and Karsi had been those girls. She’d met Sam on a night like this, in fact, quite by accident after failing to chat up his teammate. “The Grey Worm,” they called him, because he was so good at slithering out of tackles. Even better at slithering away from her! But Sam had been there to buy her a conciliatory drink, and make her laugh with his appalling dance moves, and at the end of the night she’d given her number to him instead. <em>Grey Worm, what a stupid name. We were all stupid then. </em>They must have been; these girls’ conversation was rotting her already alcohol-sodden brain.</p><p>Her legs were steadier under her when she stood. When there was a lull in the movement outside the stall door, she stepped out, washed her hands and moistened a paper towel to press to her overheated face. There, that was better. She felt almost human again. <em>No more drinks,</em> she lectured herself. <em>You will go out there and order a water and you will like it.</em></p><p> </p><p>Hours later, she awoke in the cool green dark, her body cradled in two massive arms. <em>Sam? </em>When did Sam get to the bar? Had she called him and forgotten? But no, it couldn’t be Sam, this man didn’t have his smell of books and aftershave. She squirmed against the embrace, and only then realized that they were moving, swaying down the familiar sidewalk in front of her house.</p><p>It had been a mistake to open her eyes—everything spun, and that set her stomach churning. Gilly clamped her lips shut, forcing down the sudden overwhelming urge to vomit. <em>Calm blue ocean, calm blue ocean,</em> she recited to herself until the nausea passed and she trusted herself to open her mouth again. “Who’re you?” she slurred.</p><p>“Hodor,” said Hodor. He grinned down at her, the ends of his truly impressive beard tickling her forehead. “You fell asleep. Osha asked me to get you safely inside.”</p><p>Had he picked them up? She didn’t remember that at all. Her last memory was standing in front of the bathroom mirror… and then there was a snippet of something else, somewhere else, dancing under a strobe light to Ariana Grande with another drink in her hand, but she couldn’t remember how she’d gotten it. “I… was I drugged?”</p><p>“Only by yourself, with booze,” he said cheerfully. “To tell the truth, Osha had been texting me about how boring the bachelorette party was, but you cheered her right up. Said you disappeared to the bathroom and they found you a half hour later, doing body shots with your new friend Loras. Then he bought a round of tequila for the three of you, and you starting yelling for them to play “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun.” You might have gotten away with it if you hadn’t started trying to table dance after that.” He chuckled in the same ashamed-but-amused way Sam did when their son made a poop joke. “Osha’s been thrown out of plenty of places, but never you! She’s very impressed. She’s talking about making you Maid of Honor just to see what you do at the wedding.”</p><p>Gilly groaned. She wanted to shrivel up in a hole and die, either from embarrassment or general stomach nastiness, whichever came first. One day she might be able to face Osha and Karsi again, preferably after a very long sleep and a trip to confession, but Sam would not be happy about her stumbling in reeking of cheap vodka at three in the morning. She could only hope his mother had done the same thing; it might soften the blow. <em>Now there’s a concept.</em></p><p> Hodor did not set her down until they reached the top step. “Got your key?” <em>What in the hell is he so cheerful about,</em> she thought, and frowned into her purse. Half its contents clattered out onto the stoop. “Don’t worry about it, let me find—oh, no, Gilly, why are you crying?”</p><p>Her lip had started to tremble unaccountably when she dropped her things, and now that he called attention to it, she burst into tears. “My keeeys,” she wailed, feeling increasingly ridiculous. They had fallen into the hostas where Hodor could not see them, but she could not find the words to articulate this. Instead she pointed at the flowerbed and sobbed harder. “In—there,” she gasped, her nose running. “They’re all muddy now.”</p><p>“Doesn’t matter.” Hodor groped around in the hostas until his massive hand closed around her Princess Peach keychain. “They’ll wash right off, but don’t worry about it right now—oh, that’ll be your husband,” he said as the porch light snapped on.</p><p>“Thank you,” she hiccupped. It must be convenient for Osha, that he was big enough to carry her around if necessary. “I can see why she likes you.”</p><p>“Ha!” The sound of Sam’s grumbling was becoming audible through the door. Hodor leaned in—or rather, peered down at the top of her head. “Karsi texted him some bullshit about a problem cashing out, if he asks why it took so long,” he said in an undertone. “He doesn’t know you got thrown out. Up to you if you want to mention it. Cheers!” He sauntered off whistling “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun,” leaving her crying on the stoop.</p><p>That night she and Sam had their first real fight since moving back into the family home with Melessa. Initially horrified to find her crying, he only needed to hear a few of her meandering sentences to deduce that she was just hopelessly drunk, not injured or harassed. Then he got very tight-lipped. He took her purse, fed her ibuprofen and a large glass of water, and helped her to the bathroom, all very solicitous, but underneath it was a barely controlled irritation that said, “this is irresponsible, you’re irresponsible, you’re a bad mother and a failure and a giant pain in my ass and can’t you even keep it together long enough to keep my mother from seeing this?” Or was that coming from within? Either way, he put her to bed and grabbed a pillow for the couch.</p><p>“Don’t go,” she protested. It came out as “dunggoo.” She flopped over onto her back to better look at him in the doorway. “Don’t be mad, Sam, come sleep.”</p><p>“No, Gilly. You’re drunk. Go to bed.” He flicked off the light.</p><p>A single hot surge of anger made her sit up—or lean on her elbows, anyway. How <em>dare</em> he judge her! She hardly ever drank, never in front of her son, and only last week she had found him and Jon in a worse state, and much earlier in the day, too. And Hodor had driven her home, Sam didn’t even have to do anything! “Don’t be mad,” she said again, but this time it was a command instead of a plea. “I’m allowed to go out with my friends. I have a life outside of you and Sam!”</p><p>“That’s not what I’m saying—”</p><p>“Yes it is!” She raised her voice to drown out her husband’s protests. “I w— worked all week while you were home… still made dinner after, and put Sam to sleep…” She swayed, eyes closed. “What was I..? Oh yeah! I work hard, you can watch Sam for <em>one</em> night—”</p><p>“I’m not mad about that!” The lights came back on, revealing Sam’s usually easygoing face wobbling with unspent emotion. “I was <em>worried</em>, Gilly, you haven’t stayed out so late since Sam was born, and I’ve never liked that Osha—”</p><p>“You don’t like any of my friends,” she moaned, ignoring how well he got along with Karsi for the moment.</p><p>“I don’t like how she makes <em>you</em>! You always, I don’t know, feel like you have to impress her or something—”</p><p>“Do not,” she spat.</p><p>“—So whenever you two go out I’m half convinced I’ll have to come get you out of something dangerous, and she’ll be shouting or bleeding or something. Remember when she took you to that ‘party’ that was in an abandoned storage container, and I had to drive around in the dark trying to find you for forty-five minutes?”</p><p>“That was <em>one time</em>,” she whined, “And she doesn’t go places like that anymore!”</p><p>“Oh no?” Without her noticing, the volume of the argument had increased until Sam was practically shouting.</p><p>“No!,” she screamed back, “Now she uses Google street view!”</p><p>In the mirror on the opposite wall, she saw Melessa’s furious reflection marching down the hall until she appeared behind Sam. “Will you both PLEASE. Be. Quiet.” she said through gritted teeth. “It is FOUR in the morning.”</p><p>“But Mom—”</p><p>“M’sorry,” Gilly slurred, hoping it would earn her a few points. It couldn’t hurt to get Sam’s mother on her side now, before they discussed it over coffee in the morning.</p><p>“Go to sleep,” Melessa hissed. “Both of you, even if it’s in separate beds. Nothing is this important.”</p><p>“We will, sorry for waking you.”</p><p>“G’night,” said Gilly, and attempted a wave. Melessa glared at both of them in the mirror and swept away in a swirl of distempter and floral-print cotton.</p><p> </p><p>Morning was not kind. Little Sam woke her by jumping on the bed and demanding Paw Patrol, knocking over a glass of cool, clear, temptingly refreshing water Sam had thoughtfully left on the nightstand for her. Then he howled because he was wet. Wincing and moving her head as little as possible, she found her son some new clothes, threw in a load of laundry, and put on the coffeepot before she had to lie back down. Sam had gone out, god knew where, and Melessa was doing her Saturday shopping, so her son demanded her full attention all morning. It was not until eleven that she had a chance to check her text messages.</p><p>A picture from Karsi, the two of them plus Osha grinning widely and posing in front of the “Hard Cock Life” marquee. Six texts from an unknown number. One from Melessa: “Girls’ wine and movie night? Red or white? 😘” which was code for “I want to gush about my date.”</p><p>The last was from Sam. “Jon and I are going job hunting, be back late afternoon. Not mad but we should talk. Don’t worry. Love you!” 🥰 P.S. You better have a damn good explanation for who Loras is, and why he’s texted you six times since last night.”</p><p>Loras? That name sounded familiar, kind of… she checked the unknown texts. They started with “Hey girl! You are a TRIP! Hmu and we’ll get coffee sometime!”, quickly progressed to “Text me when you’re home safe!” and ended with “ARE YOU ALIVE? 😱” Sent this morning, 9:51 a.m.</p><p>“Who IS this guy?” she muttered, staring at the string of emojis. Hodor had mentioned him, she thought… but eleven was far too early to expect Osha to be awake and more or less amiable. Maybe they’d exchanged numbers. She grabbed her purse from the hook on the back of the door, searching for her wallet…</p><p>No. No no no no no! Frantic, she removed each and every item from her purse and set it on the table—no wallet. She overturned her purse and shook it, then turned it inside out. Nothing! Praying Little Sam would not get into her things in the next thirty seconds, she left the pile unattended and ran to the bedroom, searching wildly for last night’s jeans. Every once in a while she’d put her wallet in her back pocket… but it was not there either. Nor on the nightstand, the table in the front hall, or the washing machine (which she checked, shamefaced, after exhausting every other possible place.) “Ohhh, Sam’s going to kill me,” she moaned, checking behind the coffeepot for the second time. They’d already had to budget for last night’s outing, they couldn’t afford to have their debit cards frozen for a week while they waited for new ones! They needed groceries! And that was assuming no one found the card and used it.</p><p>In a last ditch effort, she looked up the bar’s hours online and waited patiently until noon, when she could call and ask if anyone had handed it in. Most likely a futile effort, but she tried anyway.</p><p>A bored voice answered on the fourth ring. “Steward’s Bar, Edd speaking, have you tried turning it off and on again—I mean, can I help you?”</p><p>“Yes,” she said eagerly, rocking forward onto the balls of her feet. “I think I left my wallet there last night, can you check..?”</p><p>“Just a minute.” She heard the clink of a glass being set down and tasted a phantom of last night’s Sex on the Beach. <em>Never again,</em> she vowed for the umpteenth time that morning. “Yeah, we’ve got a few wallets here. Name?”</p><p>“Gilly Tarly. T-A-R-L-Y,” she spelled.</p><p>“Date of birth?”</p><p>“April 30<sup>th</sup>.”</p><p>“What are you wearing?”</p><p>She almost answered “pajamas” before the request sunk in. “Excuse me??” she spluttered. Not even afternoon and she was having to deal with this! Well, she’d never go back <em>there</em> again.</p><p>“In your <em>driver’s license photo</em>,” he said with disdain. She could just imagine him rolling his eyes, license in hand. “So I can confirm it’s you. Anyone could know your name and DOB.”</p><p>“Oh,” she piped up, feeling small. “Um—a yellow tank top, I think? And my hair’s in a ponytail.”</p><p>“Good enough for me,” he said, with no change to his tone. <em>They let this guy answer the phone?! </em>This interaction alone earned Steward’s Bar a one-star Yelp review. “Come down this afternoon and grab it. Don’t bother to ask for Edd, I’m the only one here.”</p><p><em>Hmmph,</em> she thought, ending the call. She had no desire to trek across town with her son and endure more of this Edd’s sniping, but if she left now, Sam might never know she’d lost her wallet. She ought to pick up snacks for girls’ night on the way back, too, unless she wanted to eat those weird pea crisp things Melessa was always buying. She collected Sam, her purse, her keys, and headed out the door—</p><p>Oh god, where had she left the <em>car??</em></p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Writing this chapter has made me nostalgic for nights out and my own friends' bachelorette parties 😣 RIP Neon Cactus, we will never see your like again.<br/>If it comes off like I have never seen strippers before, it's because it's the truth! I find the whole concept a little too in-your-face. I have only my friends' experiences to draw from.<br/>I really wanted to put an obviously shitty band on the marquee, but as everyone's tastes differ, I opted not to. Instead I went with They Might Be Giants, who are not shitty at all. My husband and I saw them in Detroit this past March, right before COVID lockdown began--amazing! Highly recommend seeing them if you have the chance.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Sam I</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Sam and Jon visit the unemployment office. Bran offers an unorthodox solution to their money problems.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Have you worked within the last eighteen (18) months? If so, please list each employer in order from most to least recent, including the business/company name, mailing address, phone number, dates of employment, and the reason you are no longer working for EACH employer.” There were four blank lines underneath.</p><p>Sam carefully penciled in “Night’s Watch Security” on the first line. “Hey Jon, do you remember our work address?”</p><p>“Only that it was on Fountain Street.”</p><p>Well, he’d go back to that later. His work phone number was still listed in his contacts under “Hell.” He added that to the second line, leaving a large blank space for the address. On the fourth line he entered “Reason for leaving: company-wide layoffs.” There, that couldn’t possibly cast him in a bad light, could it?</p><p>He and Jon had been at the career center for an hour and a half, filling out the reams of paperwork required to register for unemployment. He was beginning to worry they wouldn’t finish before the center closed at noon. With one car, it would be too much of a hassle to try and come back another day. He’d have to drop Gilly off at work in the small hours, drive all the way across town to the career center, fill out forms with his whining son next to him, feed him and get a nap in, somehow, then leg it back to the north side to pick Gilly up when she was done. And traffic was so bad around that time, with the factory shift change… He’d only managed today because Jon had driven them. Sam applied himself to the forms with renewed enthusiasm.</p><p>He wrapped up around 11:30 to find that he would have to come back during the week, anyway, for an appointment with a “career counselor.” “But I can’t,” he protested when he submitted his forms, “I watch my son during the week and we only have one car.” The dead-eyed woman at the front desk handed him a bus schedule.</p><p>He returned timidly to the table where Jon was finishing up his own forms. “So, we’ll need to come back for appointments before we qualify,” he said with a heavy sigh, hoping Jon would vent his ire on the lady at the desk instead of him. “I tried to tell her, but…”</p><p>“No problem, I can drive you again,” he offered, and signed the bottom of his form with a flourish. It announced “Jon SNOW!!” with the kind of childish provocativeness he would’ve expected from Arya. <em>I hope potential employers don’t see that,</em> he fretted. Interviewers never wanted to hire someone with personality.</p><p>“So, where to for lunch?” Jon asked him as they walked out. “It’s nearly noon.”</p><p>“Taco Bell?” he suggested.</p><p>“No, we had pizza last night, something lighter.”</p><p>“That <em>was</em> my light option.” They paused in the entryway to bicker rather than head out into the 95° heat with no plan. Sam was still damp with the early morning’s sweat.</p><p>“Well, I can’t put on any more weight if I want Ygritte to take me back. Unemployed is better than fat and unemployed.” <em>Like me,</em> Sam thought unhappily. “I can’t afford the gym anymore unless I use the one at the college, and they check ID about half the time. Wish I looked more like Bran.” He stood aside to let another hapless job-seeker pass.</p><p>“You can come with me, if you want,” he offered. “I’ve got a guest pass.”</p><p>“Tarly?” came a disbelieving voice. He turned. The other man in the annex, who’d so rudely shouldered past Jon, faced away from them; but he’d recognize that head of steel-wool hair anywhere. “Wouldn’t think you’d use the gym, to look at you.”</p><p>“Mr. Thorne,” he said, feeling his heart drop into his stomach. “Just as friendly as always, I see.”</p><p>“And you’re as lazy. How long have you and Snow been out of work? Two weeks?” A bitter laugh escaped him. “Thought even the two of you might’ve found something by now.”</p><p>Jon, always quick to defend his best friend, drew himself up to his full height of 5’8” to go toe-to-toe with their former boss. <em>He’s still a head shorter than Mr. Thorne,</em> thought Sam, sighing internally. Things had changed since Jon drove off his schoolyard bullies for him. He’d dealt with worse than Thorne on the football field. Before Jon could run his mouth, Sam said, “It’s not so bad. Nice to spend some time with my son. My wife can support us for a while if need be… but wait, <em>you</em> don’t have a wife anymore, do you?” He cocked his head to the side, as if the thought had come to him suddenly. “Shame she left you.”</p><p>Mr. Thorne could not hide the sudden hard clench of his jaw. “Didn’t your mother ever teach you,” he said through gritted teeth, “It’s rude to comment on a man’s personal life?”</p><p>“No more than commenting on a man’s weight, <em>Alliser</em>.” He grabbed Jon’s shoulder. “C’mon, we shouldn’t kick him when he’s down.”</p><p>“See you around.” Jon waved cheerfully as they disappeared through the double doors.</p><p> </p><p>After Jon dropped him off at home with a last snort of glee at seeing Mr. Thorne brought low, Sam spent the afternoon canvassing the internet for job listings. He’d be happy to do security again, but no one was hiring, and he was too timid to be a bouncer. Police work was out of the question. A restaurant job would conflict with Gilly’s schedule, ditto retail… <em>Why did I study epic poetry?</em> he sighed to himself. The specter of the ice cream factory hovered over him like a storm cloud. It didn’t stop him from grabbing a pint of Phish Food from the freezer, though.</p><p>It occurred to him halfway through the carton to wonder where his wife was. They hadn’t spoken since their blow-up last night, and he was feeling a prickle of doubt about how he’d behaved. She hadn’t done anything wrong, really, he was just feeling a <em>little</em> vulnerable at the moment. He didn’t like the idea of her drinking and dancing with handsome, fit men, even if it was in good fun.</p><p>“Where are you?” he typed into his phone, squinting slightly at the cracked screen.</p><p>“Store,” came the reply, almost instantly. “Got a late start. Need anything?”</p><p>He contemplated his melting carton of ice cream. “Healthy dinner,” he typed.</p><p>“Oooh, sorry, doing Girls’ Night with your mom. Hot Pockets?” A pause. “Unless you want to cook 😉”</p><p>He did not. “Broccoli and cheese,” he suggested, and hit “Send.” Broccoli was healthy, right?</p><p> </p><p>“I’d rather not do Girls’ Night, you know,” Gilly confessed as they unpacked the grocery bags. “Even the thought of wine turns my stomach, to be honest, but your mom wants to talk about her date, I think.” She paused, a can of diced tomatoes in hand. “She didn’t say anything to you?”</p><p>“Not a word,” he grunted. The freezer was already full; why had she bought more frozen vegetables?? “I didn’t ask.”</p><p>“Well, there’s your problem,” she grumbled under her breath.</p><p>“Excuse me if I don’t want a play-by-play of this <em>Oberyn</em> putting the moves on my mother,” he said hotly. “She can date whoever she likes, but I don’t want to hear anything about the man until he’s ready to put a ring on her finger.”</p><p>“And if he never does?”</p><p>“Then it’s none of my business.”</p><p>Gilly angrily stacked cans while he waged war with the frozen peas.</p><p>“You know,” he started a few minutes later, making his opening maneuvers with the cauliflower, “You’ve not explained who Loras is, yet.”</p><p>“Just a new friend,” she said with studied breeziness. “We met him last night. He was out for his boyfriend’s birthday.” “Boyfriend” was emphasized. “Bought us a few drinks, when he heard Osha was getting married. He just wanted to make sure we got home safe.”</p><p>“Boyfriend” didn’t mean Loras might not want a girlfriend, as well. He said as much.</p><p>“Oh, don’t worry about that. Your friend Edd assured me he is 100% gay.”</p><p>Edd? “The IT guy from work?”</p><p>“Yeah, he was bartending where we were last night. I met him at one of the Christmas parties, remember? I talked to his fiancée about her dress.”</p><p>He seemed to recall Gilly chatting with a very overweight woman in a flashy 50’s-style dress, but hadn’t realized she and Edd were together. “Huh. Think he could get me a job?”</p><p>“At the bar?” she asked, amused, tucking a box of bow-tie pasta into the cabinet. “I don’t know if I’d like you serving cocktails to bachelorette parties every weekend, any more than you like me going out without you.”</p><p>“Yeah,” he admitted. A rueful smile crept onto his face. “Probably silly.”</p><p>“Oh, Sam.” Wordlessly, she opened her arms, and he went to her. “I’m sorry for getting so drunk. It’s just been a long time since I’ve gone out.”</p><p>“No, I’m sorry for being a jerk,” he said, voice muffled by her hair. She smelled nice, as she always did; shea butter shampoo and sunscreen, and just a little bit of Hawaiian Punch. She smelled like home. “Feeling down about the job. Not your fault.”</p><p>“You’ll find something.” She squeezed him tight, and that was that. Fight over. His wife’s capacity for forgiveness never failed to astonish him.</p><p>As they tackled the refrigerated goods together, he gave Gilly an overview of him and Jon’s morning at the career center. She was equally dismayed to learn that an appointment with a counselor was required before he could start drawing unemployment. “But didn’t you explain—”</p><p>“That I’m essentially a stay-at-home dad for the moment? Yes, I did. They don’t care, Gilly, they view it as my problem. I can’t stay home, and I can’t take him with me.” He sighed deeply, wondering if he should give voice to the idea that had been tumbling around in the washing machine of his mind all afternoon. “I wondered if Margaery would watch him for a few hours.”</p><p>“That whore??” she squawked, in the indignant tone she adopted whenever his new stepmother was mentioned. “Never. I’d sooner take the day off. We’re busy now with back-to-school, but maybe in a month or so…”</p><p>“A month or so on one income? It’ll be tough.” His wife bit her lip.</p><p>“Would one of Jon’s sisters watch him?”</p><p>That was even less likely than his parents reconciling. For all her faults, Margaery was maternal; he was sure she’d jump at the chance to meet her (he shuddered) step-grandson. “Arya wouldn’t,” he said at once. “Sansa might, but I don’t know if I would trust her in an emergency. She always seems odd around children, have you noticed?”</p><p>“I’ll take ‘awkward with kids’ over ‘home-wrecking hussy.’”</p><p>He had to stifle a burst of laughter at that. Gilly was as modern a woman as he could want, but every once in a while one of her great-uncle Aemon’s old-fashioned phrases slipped into her speech, especially if she was fired up. No one else said “hussy,” outside of feisty leading ladies in pre-war movies. “I can ask him. Hey, maybe Rickon and Shireen would take him to the park or something for a few hours. Good practice. They’ll probably be married before too long.”</p><p>“Great idea,” Gilly enthused. “I like that Shireen, she’s going places.”</p><p>Before he could forget, he texted Jon about his cousin watching Little Sam so they could visit the career center together. While he awaited the response, Gilly prepared a snack platter for Girls Night; crackers, grapes, cheese cubes, buttered slices of baguette, a finger bowl of M&amp;M’s. He made the expected jokes about “cutting the cheese,” which Gilly ignored, and ate a handful (or two) of candy.</p><p>“Shireen’s a no go,” Jon responded as Gilly decanted a bottle of rosé. “Interning for her dad. Not free during the week”</p><p>Sam swore. “Rickon?” he texted back, with faint hope. Rickon was a nice kid, but he hardly spoke, and took his (frankly terrifying) dog with him almost everywhere. Shaggy weighed more than Little Sam did. He didn’t like the idea of the two meeting.</p><p>“You kidding me??” Jon’s response was immediate and definitive. Sam didn’t know what he’d been hoping for, really.</p><p>“Nvm. Guess it’ll be a few weeks then”</p><p>There was an interlude of about ten minutes in which Sam’s mom came home, fresh from a Saturday of errands with a bag of low-calorie snacks and gossip about Uncle Alekyne’s colonoscopy. His wife grimaced to see the party-size bag of Harvest Snaps. He, personally, was more concerned about the type of medical exam he’d be subject to in a few more years. With his family history, he could expect to be subject to the dreaded “procedure” even sooner than other men… <em>That’s the upside of being unemployed. No insurance, no “procedures.” </em>He wanted to laugh.</p><p>His pocket buzzed. Oh god, Uncle Alekyne didn’t want to share details, did he?</p><p>“Bran says he can watch Sam for a few hours. Thoughts?”</p><p>Now it was Sam’s turn to grimace. Leaving his son with Rickon or Arya was likely to be slightly dangerous, but leaving him with Bran… he’d come home with interesting vocabulary words, Serious Opinions on the military industrial complex, and probably a new hair color. Which was worse? It was all he needed for his son to blurt out “Fuck the police!,” as Bran was so fond of saying, at the unemployment office. Privately he doubted Bran had ever fucked anyone, police or no.</p><p>“Gills?” he asked quietly, beneath his mother’s steady stream of chatter about test results and the appalling insensibility of doctors. “Would it be ok for Bran to babysit while Jon and I go to the career center?”</p><p>“Of course,” she said, frowning. “Why not?”</p><p><em>On her head be it,</em> he thought, clucking his tongue.</p><p> </p><p>That Wednesday, himself, Jon, Little Sam, and Bran piled into Jon’s old car and rumbled their way to the career center. Bran had been promised “a proper meal” in exchange for watching his son, and was evidently planning to take them up on it while his generosity was fresh in their minds. Sam dressed for the occasion in a nice polo shirt, his good shoes, and a pair of jeans that weren’t stained with finger paint. His mother had expressed some trepidation about the jeans—“they’ll think you aren’t serious about getting a job,” she’d scowled—but khakis made him look wider than he really was, and he wasn’t in the mood for more smart comments from Mr. Thorne, should they chance to run into him again. <em>Besides,</em> he thought, <em>nowhere that will hire me or Jon is going to expect better than jeans.</em> He looked okay, he’d thought, in the bathroom mirror at home. Now, though, with the chiseled Jon and fresh-faced Bran beside him, he felt like a sack of oatmeal.</p><p>His interview was conducted by a buxom redhead who could’ve come straight out of a Renaissance painting, but for her sensible sleeveless blouse and plastic nametag reading “Rosalba.” “G—good morning, miss,” he said, offering an unsteady handshake. Pretty women rarely disarmed him anymore—his wife was a pretty woman, for god’s sake—but every once in a while, he was caught off guard. He hadn’t expected to meet anyone of this caliber at the unemployment office.</p><p>“Nervous?” she asked with a kind smile. “That’s ok. This can be kind of nerve-wracking for some people. But I promise, as long as you didn’t lie on your application, you’ll be just fine.” And he did feel a bit better. Her friendly demeanor (okay, and her ample cleavage) had instantly perked him up.</p><p> “Promise I won’t lie to you, Rosalba.” Damn, should he have tried to roll the “r”? Was she Latina?</p><p>“Please, call me Ros.” The studied patience with which she said it told him most people got her name wrong.</p><p>As Sam waited, the nervous drumbeat of his fingers tickling his leg, she looked over his application and references. Now and then she piped up with a question, and he answered with embarrassing quickness, feeling a complete buffoon. Was Jon failing as hard as he was? The cubbies did not allow a lot of privacy. He craned his neck, searching for his friend, but was rewarded with a scowl from middle-aged woman in the next cubicle instead.</p><p>“You have a solid work history, six years with one company,” Ros mused, pen to her lovely red lips. “But no references?”</p><p>“My old boss, Mr. Thorne, was laid off shortly after I was,” Sam explained. “Actually, I saw him here this past weekend.”</p><p>“Oh, if he’s registered with the center, it shouldn’t be a problem to get his contact details—”</p><p>“Well, I’m not sure he’d give me a reference,” he confessed. “Mr. Thorne never liked me very much. No problems with my performance,” he rushed to explain, “Just a personality clash.”</p><p>“That’s fine,” she said lightly. <em>That doesn’t sound promising.</em> It sounded like the “maybe” he gave when his son asked for a spaceship for Christmas. “Well, you were only just let go, and you’ve never applied for unemployment before. You’ve a wife and child… and you’re supporting your mother?”</p><p>“No, she has a job. We just live with her.” Was that bad? They’d moved in with his mom to save for Gilly’s degree… now that would have to wait. Again.</p><p>“Even so,” she said, drawing a heavy line underneath something written on her notepad. “You’re an ideal candidate. Hard-working, steady, loyal… we can probably find you something in the factory, if nothing else…”</p><p>He suppressed a frown. Ros was the first person he’d met at the unemployment office who actually seemed like she wanted to help, and he didn’t want to get on her bad side. “I could do that for a while,” he said with as much grace as he could muster. “Will you give me a call, or..?”</p><p>“Exactly.” Ros stood and extended her hand, signaling the end of their brief interview. Sam tried not to look too eager to shake it. “Nice to meet you, Mr. Tarly. We’ll be in touch.”</p><p>Jon’s interview wrapped up at about the same time, so they left together, thankfully without encountering their old boss. Dark clouds had gathered since they went inside, threatening a summer squall. They legged it across the parking lot and down the street to the small park where Bran had taken Little Sam. “Everything go ok?” Sam asked, raising his voice to be heard over the violent wind.</p><p>“Fine, I guess,” Jon shouted back. But his shoulders were hunched, and his hands thrust deep in his pockets. If he were a betting man, Sam would wager that Jon was flexing his hand, an old nervous habit. “The career counselor recommended the factory.”</p><p>“Mine too.” A pause as he tried to put a positive spin on it. “It wouldn’t be so bad for a while, would it? We’ve got benefits through Gilly’s work, so…”</p><p>“Well, I don’t,” Jon grumbled. “If they’d pay out the damn inheritance money I’d be able to make do, but the lawyer says it’s not likely even if my cousins agree to it.” Jon and his four remaining cousins had been struggling to manage Ned’s estate for more than a year. Despite Ned’s assurances that Jon was just as much his son as his biological children, and would be taken care of, he had died without executing a will stating his intentions. “If I have any medical problems… maybe I should’ve married Ygritte when I had the chance.”</p><p>“Do you want that?” Sam was taken aback. He couldn’t imagine Jon in a nice suit at the head of a church, waiting on his blushing bride, toasting their union, dandling a child on his knee. “I thought the two of you just wanted to do the co-habitation thing.”</p><p>“We did,” he said shortly. “Thinking better of that now.”</p><p>Little Sam met them at the swing set, covered in wood chips and with a smile to melt your heart. “Daddy!” he squealed as Sam lifted him in the air. “Elevator, elevator!”</p><p>“Elevator!” he agreed, and pumped his son in the air a few times before setting him down. “Did you have fun with Bran?”</p><p>Little Sam nodded effusively. “He’s pretty much my best friend,” his son confided, prompting him to exchange an amused glance with Jon. “He pushed me on the swings, and then we did the monkey bars, and played basketball!”</p><p>“Basketball?” Jon asked his cousin quietly, with a self-righteous lilt to his voice. “I thought basketball was ‘an unspeakable spectacle built on the backs of underprivileged foreign teens, while the masses bathe in the manifestation of the players’ hubris.’ Or something like that.”</p><p>“I stand by that statement,” Bran replied with wounded dignity. “But it’s great fun, when played out on a non-monetized stage.” Sam suspected his unsuspected affinity for basketball had something to do with his near-six-foot stature. “And it wasn’t all expressions of physical prowess, was it, Sam? We had a talk about bodily autonomy. What do you say to auntie Margaery if she tries to hug you?”</p><p>“I do not consent!” beamed Little Sam. <em>Well, that’s something.</em> Maybe Bran could work his way into the regular rotation of babysitters.</p><p>It was almost pleasant to pay for Bran’s overpriced lunch at Panera Bread after that. He’d chosen some quinoa thing that looked like it might’ve been tasty, if one added meat and bread and cheese. To his surprise, so did Jon, which left him feeling like a salad might be in order instead of the roast beef sandwich he’d been eying… and of course, he deserved a cookie for after. It had been a hard morning!</p><p>“No work talk,” Jon warned, and bit savagely into an apple. “Or I promise I will projectile vomit onto this table.”</p><p>“What’s vomit, daddy?” Sam asked curiously. He had separated the components of his grilled cheese and was eating each, one bite at a time, in turn.</p><p>“Throw-up,” he offered. “It’s not nice of Jon to mention it while we’re eating.” Jon gave him a sarcastic smile.</p><p>His friend’s cousin sighed. “You shouldn’t shield him from the realities of the world,” he advised. “Growing up sheltered will give him all manner of problems later. Speaking of… how was Gilly’s bachelorette party?”</p><p>He ignored Bran’s shit-eating grin. “Fine,” he grunted. “Except for her throwing away a hard-earned $20 on a stripper.” <em>That could’ve paid for your lunch</em>.</p><p>“$20? Isn’t that a lot for one tip?” Bran delicately wiped his mouth. “He must’ve been good!”</p><p>“I suppose so.” Usually he liked Jon’s cousin, but today, upending the quinoa bowl into his face seemed a very tempting prospect. “I’m not familiar with the etiquette.”</p><p>“Maybe the two of you should take up stripping while you’re waiting on your unemployment,” Bran joked. “Earn your rent by letting a few sexually repressed women grope you—sorry, Sam.” His son did not seem to be listening, more engaged in his leaking juice box than the grown-up’s talk, but you never knew. He might tell Gilly that Bran had taught him about groping, and then where would they be?</p><p>“Ha ha, Bran, you try that out and get back to us—”</p><p>“No,” Jon interjected, suddenly serious. “That’s actually not a bad idea.” The tilt of his head told Sam he was sincerely considering it. “All those tips for a few minutes’ work? And it’d be during off hours, too…”</p><p>His friend was running down this path of inquiry at a pace that worried him. “Yes, Jon, but to get jobs, we’d need women to <em>want to see us naked,</em> you seem to have forgotten that part.” He considered. “You might do okay, on your own…”</p><p>“Don’t be silly, it needs to be in a group. Less intimidating than one-on-one.”</p><p>“Easier to find jobs, too.” Bran nodded, then caught Sam’s disbelieving look. “What?”</p><p>“I—I can’t believe either of you are considering this,” he sputtered. “All right, back in college I might have been game, but not now, we’re old and out of shape and I’m <em>married,</em> Jon, Gilly would never approve—”</p><p>“Gilly just went to see strippers, herself. She might surprise you.”</p><p>Sam had nothing to say to that. He shoved his cookie in his pocket and lifted Sam, yelping, out of the booth. “I’m taking him to the bathroom, and when we get back, you better be done discussing this.” As he stalked toward the back of the restaurant, he thought he could hear the cousins still talking in low voices…</p><p> </p><p>His son was disappointed to see his new friend Bran dropped off at the university bookstore, where he worked part-time and spent the rest of his hours hitting on his co-workers. “’Bye,” he moped when Bran unspooled his limbs from the tiny car, and turned away, refusing the offered hug.</p><p>Bran seemed oddly pleased by this. “What do we say when we don’t want a hug?”</p><p>“I do not consent!” Sam and Jon rolled their eyes in unison.</p><p>He fell asleep as they rolled toward home, the hour of his nap having long since passed. Tentatively, Jon turned the radio on very low. The air conditioning coming out of the vents lessened considerably when he did. “You know, Bran’s idea isn’t that bad.” He stole a quick glance at Sam, then continued when he did not get an immediate rebuff. “Just for a little while, until we get real jobs. You could put some savings away, for Gilly. I could get my own apartment.”</p><p>“<em>You</em> could.” Was this some kind of sick joke? Had he forgotten Sam was fat?</p><p>“You too. Women like dad bods.”</p><p>“Do not,” he muttered. “That’s made up to feed men’s egos.”</p><p>Jon laughed. “I expected more body positivity from you, Sam.”</p><p>“You’re spending too much time with your cousins.”</p><p>Jon allowed that might be so. The song they were listening to ended and commercials came on. Heating and air, engagement rings, car dealership, auto repair, another car dealership.</p><p>Jon cleared his throat. “If we <em>did</em> start stripping—”</p><p>That was too much. Sam threw up his hands. “Enough! Do what you want! If you’re interested in shaking your ass in front of screaming women, go ahead, I won’t judge, but I am going to support my family the old-fashioned way. Yes, even at the ice cream factory, if I have to,” he said with rising hysteria. “No one wants to see <em>this</em>—,” he grabbed his belly, “jiggling around in front of them! I’d be laughed off the stage!”</p><p>“Oh, well, if you’re just worried about your weight…” <em>NOW you understand,</em> he thought, wanting to laugh. Was he so dim? “Arya can whip you into shape. She does classes four days a week, she’d be happy to squeeze in an old friend. I’ll speak to her.”</p><p>“But—”</p><p>Jon turned up the music.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Happy early Thanksgiving to my US-based readers, and happy Wednesday to everyone else 🦃 I am attempting to cook my first Thanksgiving dinner tomorrow so I wanted to get this out and off my mind tonight! Wish me luck. I'm kind of psyched actually, it's just me and my husband this year so we are doing a non-traditional menu: no nasty stuffing, green bean casserole, or dry turkey! Homemade rolls 🤤 collard greens 🤤 roasted spiced sweet potatoes 🤤 Yum!<br/>Sorry if you are finding Bran to be an snarky little asshole, he is partially based on me at the same age, hehe! I promise, he will get better.<br/>Next time we will catch up with another former employee of Night's Watch security... who will it be?</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Satin I</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Satin attends a self-defense class, and gets roped into doing a favor.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Four out of five women report experiencing sexual harassment during their lifetime. Something like one in four are sexual assault survivors. Doesn’t sound like a lot? That’s five people out of this twenty-person class.” A ripple of consternation went around the room. Someone behind him muttered, “Geez.” The sharp-eyed woman leading the class let that sink in before continuing. “Some of you are probably thinking this is an awfully heavy topic for the gym, yeah? Well, I’m not going to coddle you. If you’ve got a problem with it, you still have… four minutes to drop out and get your money back. There’s the door.” She pointed. No one made a move to leave, although a few wary women did eye the exit. “But if you want to take control and learn to protect yourself, this is the place for you. My name’s Arya. Tonight we’ll be starting with groin kicks.” Just like that, they were deep into self-defense training.</p><p>Satin liked Arya immediately. He’d been a member at the Gym of Black and White for a few years, and sampled most of the classes they offered. Too many of them started with the instructor going around the room making them introduce themselves. It was a relief not to have to come up with an interesting fact about himself (though there were many,) or to explain that no, his name was not really Satin, but yes, that was what he liked to be called. Arya was straight to the point. He had a feeling he’d get his money’s worth.</p><p>“I’ll need a volunteer to stand in as the assailant for this part. Anyone?”</p><p>Feeling optimistic, Satin raised his hand. “I’ll help.” He suspected she was skilled enough to avoid kicking him anywhere important.</p><p>“Great, come up here and turn towards me. Stand there—no, there. That’s it, yes.” When she’d maneuvered him into position, Arya finally made eye contact. She was a full head shorter than he, though Satin wasn’t exactly tall himself. “Before I start hitting you, what’s your name?”</p><p>“Satin.” He thought one of the women behind him giggled. “Yep, like the fabric!” he confirmed as Arya opened her mouth. She frowned.</p><p>“Well, thanks for volunteering, Satin. Stay very still or I might kick you on accident.” Before he knew it she lifted her forearms in a defensive pose and aimed her shin between his legs—he winced instinctively, but she only tapped him deftly on the thigh with her ankle. He waited, tense, for another assault, but that seemed to be it! She turned back to face the class. “Contrary to popular belief, it’s better to use the shin or the foot to kick the groin, because it keeps you further from the attacker,” Arya said smoothly, as if she had filed some mundane paperwork instead of kicking someone. “Only use your knee if the attacker is already in your space. Everyone see what I did?” No one spoke up. <em>They’re probably too intimidated!</em> he thought. “Questions? No? Ok, then everyone pair up and take turns practicing your stance and your kick. <em>Try</em> not to hurt each other. I’ll come around to observe and correct stances.” With a collective sigh of relief that <em>they</em> didn’t have to go before the class, the group of women began to pair off.</p><p>“Thanks again for volunteering,” Arya said to him in an undertone, “I usually have to pick someone.”</p><p>“Thank <em>you</em> for not making us go around the room and introduce ourselves.”</p><p>Arya shuddered. “Like at school? Not a period of time I want to revisit.”</p><p>“Me either!” Satin offered his habitual friendly smile, and was surprised to get one in return. Arya didn’t look like she found much to smile about.</p><p>“Why don’t you pair up with Sam?” she suggested. “You’re both men, you’ll be more cautious about not actually kicking each other.” She waved her hand at the back right corner, but there was no need; this Sam must be the only other male in the class. “Sam! C’mere!” she called.</p><p>Sam ambled forward, a large man unsuccessfully trying to hide himself behind his petite classmates. “Yeah?” He didn’t look like someone who needed self-defense; he was near Satin’s own height but outweighed him by a considerable amount. There was something in his stance that suggested a certain amount of strength and confidence despite his girth. Not someone a drunk malcontent or a mugger would consider “easy pickings.” <em>I bet he used to play football,</em> Satin thought, and barely suppressed an eye-roll.</p><p>“Sam, work with Satin while I observe? Thanks.” She didn’t wait for a reply—one hapless woman had aimed too high and kneed her companion in the stomach.</p><p>Sam shoved his hands deep in his pockets—<em>pockets?? At the gym?</em> He wondered again what Sam was doing here. “Bossy, isn’t she?” he said lightly, putting on his best “bro” voice. He had known immediately that Sam was straight, and in this part of the country, it was usually best to avoid any mention of his sexuality until someone proved they could handle it with class.</p><p>“Always has been,” Sam muttered, but finally showed a trace of humor by grinning. “My best friend’s cousin. I think she takes a perverse pleasure in kicking my ass.”</p><p>“Oh yeah? That why you’re here?” He moved into a defensive stance.</p><p>“Yeah,” he agreed, looking sheepish. “She’s supposed to help me get into shape, but this is her only class that had an opening right now—wait, wait,” he babbled, and covered his groin with a hand. “You’re not really going to kick me, are you?”</p><p>“Not if you hold still!”</p><p> </p><p>The two of them worked together on groin kicks, and later palm strikes. By the time they moved on to throwing elbows, Satin felt he could let his guard down a little. He had learned that Sam used to be in better shape—he <em>had</em> been a football player, a kicker—but let the pressures of a nine-to-five (or three-to-eleven) and fatherhood get to him. He wanted to take the weight off for his wife and son’s sake, he said, but wouldn’t meet Satin’s eyes. Satin casually mentioned his drag performances as his own reason for taking the class, and his partner had seemed surprised but not disgusted. That counted for something, in this area. Not much, but something.</p><p>Arya dismissed the class precisely at the hour mark, something else he appreciated. “Same time next week,” she ordered, re-doing her ponytail to make it even tighter. “Practice once or twice before you come back because we’ll move pretty fast.” Not waiting around for a “good-bye!” or “thanks!” from her students, she strode out and made a beeline for the staff room.</p><p>While he didn’t mind the abrupt exit, he sensed the ladies around him would’ve preferred a more traditional end to the class. “That’s it?” scoffed one of them, a whip-thin middle-aged lady with a faint moustache. “You’d expect a bit more hospitality for the price. Show us around at the very least! I don’t even know where the locker room is.” <em>Maybe if you’d paid attention instead of pouting the whole time, you’d have got your money’s worth,</em> he thought, rolling his eyes.</p><p>“Mom, don’t,” sighed the blond teenager next to her, patting a towel to the back of her sweaty neck. She, at least, had been hard at work. “We’ll figure it out. And don’t you dare whine about it in front of Rickon.”</p><p>“I’m just saying,” her mother protested, looking sour at having her complaints quashed.</p><p>Satin became aware that Sam was trying to conceal himself again, this time behind him. “Aunt Selyse,” he moaned, “Oh god, I didn’t recognize her without the glasses. She’ll go on for an hour if she sees me… Satin, would you do me a solid and distract her for a minute while I slip out? I’ll owe you one.”</p><p>“Everyone wants a favor tonight,” he mused, but softened it with a grin. Older women found him charming, and it would be good karma. “Go on, I’ll catch up with you in the locker room.”</p><p>It was encouraging to find that Sam preferred to be alone in the locker room with him than deal with his (admittedly detestable) aunt. Maybe he’d finally found a gym buddy! “Thanks,” his new friend squeaked, hustling to the door faster than Satin would’ve believed possible.</p><p>“Pardon me,” he said to Selyse, interrupting a steady stream of new grievances. “But I’d be happy to give you a tour, I’ve been a member here for years…”</p><p> </p><p>After a few minutes’ suspicious questioning, no doubt intended to reveal if he was interested in her teen daughter, Selyse was convinced of either his gayness or his basic decency, because she allowed him to show them both the locker rooms, the weight room, the ladies-only area and the small store where they could purchase basic workout gear. She balked at what she felt was the gym’s desperate attempt to grab every last cent from her, though her daughter, who he learned was called Shireen, just rolled her eyes at that. “We don’t have to buy any of that to work out here, mom, it’s just in case you forgot something, or want a shirt with the gym logo on it. Right Satin?” She seemed pleased to have an ally against her mother’s particular brand of insanity.</p><p>“Right,” he said with a smile. Nothing annoyed rude people more than genuine courtesy. “Well, it was nice meeting you both. See you next week?”</p><p>“I don’t know about that,” muttered Selyse, looking mutinous. “If I hadn’t already paid for the first three classes up front—”</p><p>“Yes, we’ll both see you soon,” interrupted Shireen, waving gaily as he backed out of the room.</p><p>The sudden blast of sweat and foot odor from the men’s locker room was almost pleasant in comparison. He’d spent enough time with the mother-daughter pair that he fully expected Sam to be gone, but he was waiting for him in street clothes, hair wet from the shower. “Thanks for that. I hope she didn’t give you too much of a hard time?” he asked, sounding sheepish and wringing his hands. “I know that was a big ask for someone I just met, but she’s… well. I imagine you know, now.”</p><p>“She’s quite a pill,” he agreed. “Your cousin’s a sweet kid, though. Hard to believe they’re related.” He’d stripped off his shirt and was already tugging at his pants before he thought better of it. Would Sam be uncomfortable for a gay man to undress in front of him?.. But of course, if he’d played football, he wouldn’t be fazed by naked men. Satin decided to risk it. Sam could just as easily turn away if it bothered him!</p><p>Far from being offended, he seemed rather <em>too</em> comfortable. He could tell Sam’s eyes were on him even with his back turned. “Your aunt doesn’t think much of Arya,” he ventured, feeling awkward as he dropped his pants. He was used to being leered at during his shows, or at the bar, but not here. The Gym of Black and White took a very firm stance on sexual harassment on the premises. He’d assumed Sam liked women, but now he was beginning to question that… maybe the lingering aura of sportsball was throwing him off. “I hope that doesn’t cause a problem for you.”</p><p>That seemed to snap Sam out of it. “Oh no, she knows what Selyse is like. Her brother Rickon’s been dating Shireen for years.”</p><p><em>Of course they fucking know each other,</em> he thought, distracted from his worries by the inevitability of small-town politics. <em>Goddamn Midwest. Everyone knows everyone.</em> And now he knew three more. If he didn’t leave soon he’d become one of them.</p><p>“Um, Satin. If that’s what you like to be called?” Sam had gone timid again, like when Arya called on him in front of everyone.</p><p>“Actually I prefer Chiffon.” Sam didn’t seem to realize that was a joke. “It’s fine,” he said gently, “what were you going to say?”</p><p>“You, ah, said you did drag?” Water was running down Sam’s brow—from his shower, or from new sweat, he couldn’t tell. “Does that involve dancing at all? Sorry to ask something so stupid, it’s just, my friend Jon, well…”</p><p>If he didn’t put an end to this soon, Satin suspected his new friend might actually tie himself in a knot. “Sometimes,” he mused, “But I like to focus on bantering with the audience. That’s more my specialty. Others do dance, of course, or sing. Why do you ask? Thinking of trying it yourself?” He was beginning to suspect this was leading to something more interesting than Sam being attracted to him. “You don’t have to be gay, you know.”</p><p>“Oh, no, I couldn’t,” he blustered. <em>Yep, that’s definitely sweat.</em> “It’s just, well, I’m out of work at the moment—my company closed—and my friend Jon as well, and his cousin—Arya’s brother—he, ah…”</p><p><em>Sweet tap-dancing Christ.</em> How did he ever get a sentence out?</p><p>“…Bran had an idea that Jon should take up stripping to earn some extra money while he’s out of work, and he probably could, he’s pretty good-looking, at least my wife says so… But he wants me to join him! And I can’t do that, I couldn’t dance to save my life even if I did get in shape, not to mention my father would probably <em>actually</em> disown me if he ever heard about it…”</p><p>When they were first paired together in class, Satin hadn’t expected to feel any sympathy for this man, with his college sports career and wife and son and white-bread life that was only notable for its lack of creativity; but insecurity about his looks and a disapproving father, well, he could certainly relate to that. <em>Stop liking these people,</em> he scolded himself, but it didn’t take. He didn’t have it in him to brush of such an obvious plea for help. “That’s… a lot,” he said carefully, pulling a fresh shirt over his head to avoid looking directly at Sam. “Are you sure your friend isn’t just giving you a hard time?”</p><p>“I think Bran was, but Jon’s been pretty persistent,” he moped. “Like I told him, he can do whatever he wants and I’ll support him, just leave me out of it.”</p><p>“You really wouldn’t think less of him if he did stripping on the side?” he asked, curious, and pulled off his sweaty socks. Thank god Sam wasn’t actually interested, he didn’t want to use them as weapons.</p><p>He shrugged. “He’s my best friend,” he said simply, as if that explained everything.</p><p><em>You need to stop making connections here,</em> hissed his voice of reason, but he was already pulling his phone out of his gym bag. “Give me your number,” he prompted, “I’ll text you. If your friend Jon wants to talk stage presence, or, ok, a few easy dance routines… he can give me a call.” After a moment’s consideration, he added, “You too, if you change your mind. No pressure.”</p><p>“Thanks, really,” he said, with a thousand-watt smile. “It’s funny, my wife actually came home with another guy’s number earlier this week. Now I have one too!”</p><p> </p><p>Not even four hours passed before Jon got in touch. “Hey, this is Jon, Sam’s friend. Have I reached Stain?” Before he could respond, Jon responded with a second rapid-fire text: “I mean Satin, sorry”</p><p>He chuckled at the auto-correct. “Yes this is Stain how can I help you,” he sent off with a wry smile.</p><p>“Sam said you might be able to help out with our routine, thanks a lot! Would you be willing to meet us for a beer or something this week so we can talk? I’ll buy” Then: “Lol I’m putting you in my contacts as Stain just so you know”</p><p>“Lol gross. Yeah we can meet, I’m free Thursday night”</p><p>“Meet at the Nightfort, around 8?”</p><p>“Dunno where that is, sorry, I haven’t lived here long!” he texted back. Satin didn’t like to lie, but the Nightfort was a dump; a cheap, shoddy college bar where he’d gone to meet a Grindr hookup one desperate night after Pyp dumped him. It had been raining, and the staff set out buckets behind the bar to catch drips from the leaky roof. After seeing one land in the watered-down drink the bartender was preparing for him, he’d hightailed it out of there, hookup be damned. He’d taken it as a sign that he wasn’t ready to jump back into the dating pool. The odor of stale popcorn that clung to him for days afterward had further reinforced that belief.</p><p>“Ok that place is shit anyway. The bar at Sable Hall?” The change of venue was most welcome; Sable Hall was classy.</p><p>“Sounds good. See you then, Join (what my auto-correct calls you!)”</p><p> </p><p>“Another old-fashioned, sir?” asked the bartender. Her long waterfall of dark hair was pulled back in a demure French twist, an odd complement to the black bow tie and crisp white shirt she wore. <em>She’s half Yvette, half Jeeves.</em> No one in this town could dress.</p><p>“Please,” he said, pushing a five-dollar bill across the gleaming bar. If his companions were paying, he could handle the tips. He even felt a little bit bad about that. Sam had mentioned they’d both lost their jobs. It was the least he could do to keep the bartender sweet. And no matter her dress sense, the girl could make a cocktail.</p><p>After presenting him with another outstanding old fashioned, the pretty bartender left him to wait for his friends in peace. They were running a bit behind; he’d received texts from both “Join” and “Sam – Gym” saying something about traffic around the mall and honestly, the less said about that, the better. Given their distance from Sable Hall, though, he figured he had at least twenty more minutes to kill before he could expect company, and he intended to put it to good use. Satin had spent his college years in ruthless pursuit of his business degree, but his junior year boyfriend had studied dance, and he’d <em>just about</em> remembered the steps to an old routine they’d practiced together.</p><p>He was still struggling to remember the end—had there been fouettés?—when the revolving door squeaked to life behind him. Somehow he knew it had to be Sam and Jon. It was still light outside, too early to be drinking in earnest, and Sable Hall was the kind of place that stayed empty between business lunches and evening cocktails to toast a hard day’s work at the office, or the courthouse, or the golf course.</p><p>Sam’s hearty greeting confirmed it, but it wasn’t meant for him. “Jeyne!” he gushed, making the expert bartender turn her head. “I wondered if you’d be working tonight!”</p><p><em>Of course they fucking know each other,</em> he thought again, watching her and Sam make cheerful small talk. He took the opportunity to study the man he assumed was Jon. Instead of the trimmer, blonder version of Sam he’d expected, the man now slumping awkwardly against the bar was <em>gorgeous</em>. Fit, well groomed, and a headful of curls just begging him to be tousled—not thick, unruly curls like his own, but tamed and bouncy. Maybe it was the traffic, or just Sam’s irritating volubility, but he wore a tempting pouty expression that made Satin want to bite his lower lip, and the edge of the bar was making his shirt ride up <em>just so…</em></p><p>But openly lusting over his friend wouldn’t help Sam, who he was beginning to like despite the odds, so Satin coughed and downed the last of his cocktail. The bitter perfume of the orange peel helped clear his head. So Jon was kinda hot, so what? With any luck he’d be back in Miami before the end of the year, and he knew himself well enough to foresee that any kind of romantic entanglement would complicate that, one-sided or not. <em>He’s probably not even gay,</em> his inner voice reasoned.</p><p>Jeyne’s chirpy voice interrupted his reverie. “Can I get you anything else?” She’d turned her shoulders to face him, attentive as always, but the rest of her body still slanted toward Sam and Jon. Obviously she wanted his leave to chat with her friends.</p><p>“One more, and put it on their tab,” he cracked. “These are the guys I was waiting on.”</p><p>“Oh, you should’ve said! I’d’ve given you the discount.”</p><p>“Please do,” Sam murmured, and quietly ordered himself and Jon a pair of Boston Lagers, each one half the price of an old fashioned. Satin wrinkled his nose, feeling guilty.</p><p> </p><p>In the interest of a more discreet conversation, they moved from the bar to a corner booth. Sam still looked a bit put out at the drink prices. “More expensive than last time I was here,” he muttered. “Why did you choose this place, Jon?”</p><p>“Oh, I got it,” Jon assured him. “Put your wallet away.”</p><p><em>Hot AND generous,</em> Satin mused, before reprimanding himself. That way lay trouble. Hoping to distract himself, he asked, “You seem to know everybody we run in to, Sam, is your family in politics?”</p><p>“Yes,” he said shortly, closing the door on that topic of conversation. “Satin, Jon. Jon, Satin.”</p><p>“Nice to meet you,” said Jon, with an easy smile that made his heart beat just a little bit faster. Or maybe that was the two cocktails he’d had. “Sorry about that back at the bar, Jeyne is my cousin’s roommate.”</p><p>“Arya?” he asked, pleased at the opportunity to show himself both attentive and intelligent. “I met her at our self-defense class. She’s really good, taught us some useful stuff already.”</p><p>“I was talking about Sansa, actually, but I’ll let Arya know you like her class, she’ll be happy to hear that. She was so nervous about leading it.”</p><p>“Really?” He leaned forward, fascinated despite himself. He would never have guessed the self-assured young woman who took control of her class with such a firm hand would be nervous about anything. “She doesn’t let it show. She was very, well, <em>forceful</em> with some of the less attentive members.”</p><p>Jon chuckled, and Satin noted unhappily that it made him even more handsome. “Forceful describes her very well. She’s supposed to work there a year before leading any classes, but her boyfriend Jaqen is the manager, and I remember she—”</p><p>“Uh, Jon?” Sam interrupted. “Don’t mean to be rude, but I have to be home before ten or Gilly will get worried.” He granted Satin a patient eye-roll. “My wife, you know. Jon forgets now that he’s single again.”</p><p><em>Hot and generous AND single,</em> he thought, and tried to have no additional feelings about that piece of information. He’d almost forgotten Sam was there. Talking to Jon was so easy, almost like… <em>almost like Pyp,</em> he thought, but that wasn’t helpful either.</p><p>“Right.” Jon thumped his glass on the table. “I’ll be straight with you, Satin, I’m out of work and things aren’t looking very good for me financially. My girlfriend threw me out—” His heart sank. “—I’m living with my teenage cousins, which is a nightmare, and the inheritance my uncle promised me doesn’t look like it’s going to come through. Stripping doesn’t seem like the worst idea at this point. Sam said you had some experience with drag shows, and I know it’s not a <em>direct</em> comparison, but—”</p><p>“I’ll do it,” he blurted out, in a sudden rush of irresponsibility.</p><p>“You’ll do—what, sorry?” Jon blinked.</p><p>“Join your act! You were looking for more people, right? Can’t do a show with just the two of you.”</p><p>“Hey,” Sam said warily, eyes widening, “I never agreed to this—”</p><p>“You’d really do that? We only wanted help with the act, but if you’re up for more, we’d love to have you.” His pulse raced as Jon looked him up and down. “If you don’t mind me saying so, I think you’d be a real draw… to the patrons.”</p><p>He laughed in what he hoped was a carefree way. “Why not? I’m an adventurous guy. And I don’t really know many people around here. Might be good for me.”</p><p>“Only you two could think stripping was good for anyone,” Sam muttered.</p><p> </p><p>He departed the Sable Hall bar with a nice buzz and a massive, debilitating crush on Jon. <em>It’s just a little infatuation,</em> he told himself as he walked back to his apartment, sweat blooming on his skin the instant he stepped outside. <em>Once you spend some more time around him it’ll fade. He’s straight. He’s unemployed. And you aren’t ready to date yet anyway, are you? </em>Good arguments all. Nonetheless, he imagined Jon’s dark curls and pouty lips as he strolled home, feeling a bit indulgent and daring in the summer evening. <em>Even if he’s off limits, I’ll still get to see him naked. How bad could it be?</em></p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>So I lied to you in my last update--this was supposed to be an Alliser chapter, but when I sat down to write Satin came to me instead. I think it works better this way, actually. Hopefully none of you were waiting for Alliser with bated breath.<br/>Will every imaginary location in this story be named after Night's Watch castles? Quite possibly.<br/>Sorry for any errors--I did not do any editing of the second half of this chapter beyond a read-through for typos.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Alliser I</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>An interview at another security firm throws Alliser and Sam back together, with unpleasant consequences. Later, Alliser does some internet snooping.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Gold Cloaks Inc. – Our quality is dyed in the wool!” proclaimed the glass door before him in bright white lettering. <em>Should’ve done gold lettering, it’s right there in the name. </em>Alliser rolled his eyes. Night’s Watch Security had never stooped so low as this strip mall rent-a-cop outlet; but a job was a job, and even the cream of the crop still had to make ends meet. He straightened his tie.</p><p>His old buddy Jaremy had phoned a few days ago with a job offer—“they’re guaranteed to hire you, Al, with your experience it’s practically a lock”—but still he had to come in to the office to jump through the hoops and lick the appropriate asses. Humiliating, the way they made you beg for it. When he was young, a man only needed talent and work ethic to get hired. Today’s HR departments cared more about whether you used the right words than whether you worked hard. Mealy-brained bastards, all of them. But okay, he could do the song and dance for an hour or two. That always stopped once he came aboard.</p><p>The foyer of Gold Cloaks Inc. tried for classy, but was not quite up to snuff. Stiffly upholstered waiting-room chairs lined the walls, thick, soft carpet ran underfoot, and the lighting brought to mind one of those fancy restaurants the young ones liked. If the trill of electronic beeping and booping from the game store next door did not carry so easily through the thin walls, he could almost think it a decent place to work.</p><p>“Can I help you, sir?” An anemic blond surrounded by fake plants addressed him from behind the front desk, baring her tiny white teeth in a strained smile that reminded him of a child’s school photo. She looked barely old enough to have a job.</p><p>“Interview,” he grunted.</p><p>Her smile drooped and she tugged at her hair. <em>The people they have working nowadays.</em> “I’m sorry, there must be some mistake. Our next interview, Mr. Tarly, has already arrived.”</p><p>He blanched. “Alliser Thorne, eleven o’clock.” He did her the courtesy of spelling his last name, in case she was as dumb as she looked, and waited while she clicked through something on her computer screen. <em>Tarly?? </em>That slob couldn’t be interviewing for the same job, could he? He had no management experience! And no mettle at all. His mind wasn’t bad, but even after six years he still jumped at shadows like a scared puppy while on solo patrol. He belonged with the other weirdos in IT, if he did anywhere. <em>But, </em>his intuition warned, <em>less experience means they can get away with paying him less, as well.</em> A fly-by-night operation like this might do something just like that.</p><p>“Ah—here you are,” chirped the receptionist. “Thorne, eleven o’clock. I apologize, it’s so early, you caught me off guard.” It was 10:24.</p><p>“On time is late,” he barked. “Common courtesy.”</p><p>The blond stared back at him, nonplussed, her mouth hanging open like a fish. “Well you can sit here for a half hour, we have magazines… unless you care to head back and share the waiting room with Mr. Tarly, our 10:30…”</p><p>“That’ll do.”</p><p>The receptionist pointed to the back of the room. “Mr. Slynt will see you soon,” she sang.</p><p> </p><p>Tarly was ensconced in a cushy leather chair when he walked through, deep into an old edition of <em>Newsweek</em>. He seemed to be enjoying it until he spotted Alliser. “Mr. Thorne,” he warbled by way of greeting. “What are you—I mean, why—why are <em>you</em> here?”</p><p>“Same reason as you, I expect,” he growled. “Interview. Might as well go home now, save yourself the trouble. One of the other employees recommended me.”</p><p>“Maybe <em>you</em> should go home.” Sam glared, an expression that might’ve looked intimidating on another man. “The owner used to work for my father.”</p><p>Alliser sniffed the air. “Is that… nepotism I smell, Tarly? You’re rank with it.”</p><p>“I’m surprised you can smell anything over your own stench of self-importance.” Sam returned to his magazine, and they said no more.</p><p> </p><p>Mr. Slynt kept him waiting until ten after, pushed for an abbreviated interview—"Feel like an early lunch,” he’d mused—and wasted half of their time slobbering over cute blond Myrcella at the front desk. Until Alliser offered a copy, he didn’t even have a resume to consult. <em>That man has no business conducting interviews, </em>he fumed. Just as well. One look at the way Slynt greeted the next job seeker, a slick-looking man he clapped on the back and greeted as “Deem!!,” confirmed that the interview had been a farce. Jaremy was not going to enjoy his next phone call, oh no. But first, coffee.</p><p>He strode past Starbucks, that opiate of the masses, in favor of the nearest McDonald’s, where one could still get a cup of coffee for a reasonable price with none of the fake Italian crap on top. They probably wouldn’t even ask if he wanted cream or sugar. <em>Just the way I like it.</em></p><p>But it must have been a day for stupid coincidences, because the first face he saw inside was Tarly’s, mouth open to gobble down a burger. <em>Typical, </em>he thought with derision. Sam had scarfed down fast food almost every shift, no wonder he weighed so much. Did the man’s wife never feed him at home? Shaena wasn’t around to cook for <em>him </em>anymore, but he’d gotten on with it. It wasn’t so hard. Most boxes and cans you could get at the supermarket had recipes on the back.</p><p>He sauntered over, feeling a need to dole out some criticism of his own. “Good interview?” he jeered, taking a sip of coffee. “Saw something in the trash that looked suspiciously like your resume. Had food stains on it, anyway, so I assumed it was yours.”</p><p>“That so?” Tarly looked bored. “Saw something in the trash that looked suspiciously like your face.”</p><p>He bit back a snort of amusement. Something about the childishness of the insult struck his funny bone. “The place was shit anyway. If Slynt’s that disorganized in front of the public, think what he’s like with his employees.”</p><p>“I wouldn’t mind a little benign neglect,” Sam muttered. “S’better than someone breathing down my neck.”</p><p>“I breathed down your neck, Tarly, because it would be my ass if you screwed up,” he snarled, their momentary comradery disappearing quicker than soda down Tarly’s gullet. “You and Snow were always too busy complaining about me and gossiping about your hairdos, or whatever you girls do, to pay attention to anything that wasn’t right under your noses. Remember the time you were working the fairgrounds, and that boy wandered away from his parents so long that they were making appeals over the PA system?” The boy was fine, happy as a clam on the back of Jon’s security cart. He and Sam hadn’t heard him climb on because they were bickering about how to best beat the carnival games.</p><p>“Yeah, well, that turned out ok, didn’t it?” Sam shoved a wad of fries in his mouth, hurrying to end the conversation.</p><p>“And what’s he doing now? Not even applying for this penny-ante job. Take some well-meant advice from me, Tarly; wherever you go next, leave Snow behind. Without him around you might pull your head out of your ass long enough to make something of yourself. You’ve a wife and son to support, god help them. He’ll only hold you back.”</p><p>“And what about you? Do you ditch everyone you care about when they aren’t useful to you any longer? Yeah, Jon is struggling right now, I know that. I also know he was by my side when I needed him. That’s what friends are <em>for,</em>Mr. Thorne. If you don’t understand that, I feel sorry for you.” Sam swept his trash into a pile on his tray and stood. “Good luck with the job.”</p><p> </p><p>Later, drunk on caffeine and his own anger, Alliser paced his apartment. Shitty as it was, he’d been counting on that job to bring in a living wage until a better opportunity came along. And there would be better opportunities, he was sure—his work record was unblemished—but rent was due by the 5<sup>th</sup>, and he had two missed calls from Shaena since the weekend. He was in no mood to listen to her nagging voicemails, but he was sure it was about her alimony. <em>She won’t be calling for the pleasure of my conversation.</em></p><p>As he surveyed his empty cabinets, he realized he also needed to go shopping. Unlike Tarly, he didn’t need a double cheeseburger for every meal, but the lone box of Triscuits staring mournfully down at him from the top of the refrigerator wasn’t going to cut it. Inside was even worse news; condiments, coffee creamer, and takeout that he no longer remembered purchasing. He cracked the Styrofoam lid and sniffed. Mexican? The guacamole wasn’t salvageable, but the rest might do. He fixed himself a plate of refried beans and a tidy pile of crackers and sat down to yet another lunch in front of his computer screen.</p><p>There were three new listings on the job sites since the morning. One met his standards, but clicking on the job title led him to a page for a “Rainbow Guard.” Terrified that he might’ve stumbled across some sort of all-gay security team, Alliser hurriedly closed the window and deleted his browser history for good measure. In his inbox, there was an ad for Viagra (banished to his spam folder) and a few comment notifications from a woodworking forum he frequented. Those he appreciated, but they’d have to wait for the end of his “work day.”</p><p>Cramming a bean-dipped cracker in his mouth, Alliser dashed off a thank-you e-mail to Mr. Slynt just in case. You never knew. Maybe “Deem” wouldn’t take the job after all. <em>Or maybe he’ll get hit by a car. </em>An encouraging thought. Since he wasn’t busy, anyway, Alliser allowed himself to indulge in a brief fantasy that involved Deem and Mr. Slynt being t-boned in an intersection on the way to lunch. It cheered him. With one manager down and another vacancy on top of that, Gold Cloaks Inc. would be sure to reach out to him. Hell, he might even put in a good word for Tarly. Not Snow, though. He’d never amount to anything. Odd, considering his family’s reputation; but too much success could ruin a man as easily as too much hardship. He’d never had to work for anything, that much was clear. Probably he was waiting for Tarly to get hired on somewhere, and needle away at him until he found something for Jon as well. Oh yes, he’d known other people who wanted a free ride. Married one.</p><p><em>Actually… </em>Spurred on by a sudden, fiendish need to meddle in a life worse than his own, Alliser’s fingers danced across the keys, and he found himself staring down a Google search for Jon Snow. Disappointing, really. He didn’t know what he’d expected. A few references to him in local newspaper articles about his uncle—Ned had been <em>everywhere</em> a few years back—one ancient mention of his meager successes on the high school’s track team, a LinkedIn profile, and then nothing. Nothing except videos of weathermen named Jon, anyway. He clicked on the LinkedIn profile, but it failed to feed his anger. Someone with a better eye than Jon had clearly looked it over. As a last resort, he copied the e-mail address and pasted it into Google.</p><p><em>Bingo. </em>Craigslist, in a section called “talent gigs.” “Seeking dancers, entertainers, talent for small local show – no experience required – male only.” A slow, wicked smile spread across his face.</p><p> </p><p>A short man with a sour face brought him a beer. Alliser wasn’t much for drink during the week, but if he was going to hide out here at Steward’s Bar and spy—no, <em>observe</em>—whatever scheme Snow was getting up to, he ought to play the part. “Thanks,” he grunted, and examined his pint glass. No finger marks, lip prints, or detergent remnants; should be safe. He took a cautious sip.</p><p>The bartender was studying him. <em>Hope he doesn’t want a tip for pouring a glass of beer, ‘cause he’s not getting one. </em>“Yes?” Alliser said testily.</p><p>“You don’t remember me at all, do you?” He made it sound almost conversational. The bartender picked up a glass and began rinsing it as he spoke, which was the last thing Alliser wanted. Any more chit-chat and he might have to go find a table instead, but it was easier go unnoticed at the bar than alone. The place was practically empty. It was the middle of the afternoon on a Wednesday, for Christ’s sake, any man worth his salt was at work somewhere.</p><p>“’Course I do,” he grunted. “Eddison Tollett, forty-three, IT. Worked at Night’s Watch for, oh… eight years, was it? Did a fair job, though as I recall you never were able to figure out why my computer kept beeping at me. See? I remember you. Doesn’t mean we have to live in each other’s pockets.”</p><p>For once, the IT-professional-cum-bartender didn’t have a sarcastic comment for him. “Actually,” he ventured, setting aside the pint glass to dry, “Someone installed a program on your machine to make it beep at odd intervals. I found it right away. Just never fixed it.”</p><p>“And why is that,” he grumbled, though he thought he could guess.</p><p>Edd shrugged. “Thought it was funny.” <em>Definitely not getting a tip. </em></p><p>“I’ll keep that in mind for when I get a new job. Tell them not to hire you.”</p><p>At that moment, a group of four noisy patrons clattered through the door, letting in a blast of humid air. <em>Snow,</em> he thought. There he was, only a few feet distant, laughing away as happy as you please. <em>Won’t be laughing anymore when I’m done with him. </em>For he had a very good idea of who had rolled those trashcans into his office, and employee or not, he didn’t intend to let Snow get away with it. The sweater he’d collected from his desk drawer <em>still</em> reeked.</p><p>Tarly, as usual, was his shadow, but there were two others with them today, a man his ex-wife would’ve sneeringly called “fancy” with hair even wilder than Snow’s, and a youth who looked barely old enough to be out of braces. He thought that one might be one of Snow’s young cousins. There was a moment’s impulse to call the non-emergency police line and report a bar selling to underage patrons, but that would blow his cover, and (he hated to admit it) he was curious about what Snow was up to. What sort of “male talent” could he be looking for? Was this what the young ones did to set up dates nowadays? He wouldn’t be at all surprised to find out that Snow was a “confirmed bachelor,” he spent so much time fussing with his hair, but then why bring his best friend and cousin along? Some kind of vetting process? <em>Could’ve used that myself,</em> his inner voice mused, before he told it to shut up. Alliser hunched his shoulders and returned to his beer, pulling his cap down to hide his face.</p><p>Half an hour’s reconnaissance provided him with no new information. Well, that wasn’t entirely true; Snow’s kid cousin had declaimed on several topics ranging from the state of the restroom to the recent foibles of a local Congressman, but they mostly ignored him, and Alliser did too. He checked his watch. Late, as usual. If they didn’t get started soon on… whatever they were up to, he’d have to ask Tollett for another drink, and his voice might be recognized.</p><p>He was still nursing the dregs of his beer and pondering what to do when a flashy peacock of a man strutted in from off the street, fingering his moustache. Tattoos of flowers and birds and wanton women covered his arms and chest—bare, in the middle of the day!—and both his hair and his beard were dyed blue. Blue! <em>Damn millennials,</em> he thought, scowling. He even had one of those stupid fucking curly moustaches. What horrible childhood misfortune could turn a decent man into <em>that</em>, he couldn’t imagine.</p><p>Naturally, he headed straight for Snow and Tarly. Alliser made a series of small, frantic movements intended to grab Tollett’s attention, but his former employee had seated himself on a spare milk crate behind the bar and was utterly engrossed in a copy of <em>Lonesome Dove</em>. <em>Or pretending to be.</em> “Tollett,” he hissed, drumming his fingers. “For fuck’s sake, you’re working!”</p><p>“Not my boss anymore, Alliser,” he said laconically, turning a page. “Ask nicely.”</p><p>A vein pulsed in his temple. “Would you <em>please</em>,” he hissed, “Peel yourself off that crate and pour me another beer? Unless you want me to take my business elsewhere.” <em>You entitled prick.</em></p><p>“Funny thing,” Tollett said, after making a show of marking his page. “People like you always say that like it’s a threat.” He moseyed over to the tap and began the laborious process of selecting a glass.</p><p>“Let me explain economics to you. I have money that can be exchanged for goods and services. You provide those, I hand over my money to the bar, and you’re paid out of the income. Seems to me, you need the happy customer to pay your salary.”</p><p>“Seems to me, I get paid the same whether you drop your ten measly dollars here or down the street at The Oakenshield—which, by the way, you’d hate even more than this place. It’s not like you’ll tip.” He pushed a pint across the bar to Alliser, none too gently. Froth slopped over the rim. “Why are you here, anyway? If you want to drown your sorrows, I’d be happy to provide directions to the nearest lake.”</p><p> “Ha, ha, funny man,” he countered. “Wouldn’t be here at all, except…” He jerked a thumb at Snow’s little enclave in the corner. “This idiot’s put up a Craiglist ad for ‘male talent,’” he hissed, complete with air quotes. “Definitely unsavory, possibly illegal. Thought I’d take a look. Even <em>you</em> might be interested in that. Unless you want your quiet little establishment turning into Studio 54.”</p><p>“I should be so lucky,” Tollett muttered, but he looked interested. “What are they doing, d’you reckon?”</p><p>Together they observed the five men in the corner. The newcomer was doing some kind of dance, or possibly a mating ritual, while the others looked on. <em>Like a barnyard animal, </em>he thought, scoffing, until he realized he was watching <em>them</em> watching the humiliating display. Alliser stuffed down a little flare of embarrassment.</p><p>The blue-haired man’s exhibition ended with a fey little twirl and a stomp. Snow’s young cousin leapt from his seat, applauding. “<em>Great</em> footwork!” he cheered. “And your use of satire—so cheeky.”</p><p>“Yeah, that was better than I expected from someone with no professional training,” agreed the fourth man, neither Snow nor Tarly. “You can definitely dance. Moves, check. Looks, check <em>and</em> check.” He winked. Alliser could vomit. He had no problem with the gays—every man was entitled to do whatever he liked in the privacy of his own home—but did they have to be so, well, <em>obvious</em> about it? “So, how do you feel about nudity?” he asked the newcomer.</p><p>Tollett snickered. “Nudity? What <em>are</em> they doing?”</p><p>It came to Alliser that the two of them must look like schoolgirls gossiping, heads bowed together, whispering over the cute boys in the corner. That made him <em>actually</em> want to vomit. “Don’t want to know any more, to tell you the truth,” he mumbled, pulling away and resettling himself firmly on his barstool. “You hear that man? Looking for male strippers, they are. Why, I can’t imagine. Country’s going to the dogs.”</p><p>“Mmm… could be performance art,” Tollett considered. He made no move to return to his book, however. “Or life drawing.”</p><p>He couldn’t imagine Snow drawing, from life or otherwise. “Why don’t you perform the art of printing my bill?” Alliser growled. He’d come here hoping to see Snow humiliated, but the incident had left him feeling mortified instead. The entire day would be a wash, now, for he wouldn’t dare submit more resumes after two beers. <em>Waste of my goddamn time. Why did I bother? </em>On the heels of that thought came, in the voice of his ex-wife, <em>You wanted to feel superior.</em> Alliser smacked his lips, trying to rid himself of the bad taste in his mouth.</p><p>Tollett was at least eager to provide his check, if it meant he would leave. “Comes to $11.71. Cash or credit?” Alliser handed over a creased, floppy $20, scowling. This stupid afternoon cost most of his “fun money” for the week. He’d have to stay in on the weekend, he couldn’t let Jaremy pay for their golf game again. “I’ll call you if they start taking off their clothes,” Tollett offered, nodding at Snow’s group of twittering idiots. “Unless you’d prefer a picture?”</p><p>“Get bent,” he snarled, and stormed out.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I don't think it needs to be said, but Alliser's views do not reflect my own. You never know what people will willfully misinterpret on the internet!<br/>So, the dude auditioning for their little troupe is Daario. Probably clear to book readers, but in the show he doesn't have the fetching blue hair/gold mustache combo, so I wanted to confirm. He seems like he might be comfortable with some casual nudity!<br/>Alliser's little "Money can be exchanged for goods and services" speech is a reference to The Simpsons, and oft quoted in my home.<br/>Next chapter, we'll be checking back in with Jon, if all goes according to plan. Hopefully soon!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Jon II</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Our foursome holds their first practice, Bran in tow, and Jon has an awkward encounter with Satin. Later, they are interrupted by a familiar face.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>“I'm just a bachelor / I'm looking for a partner / Someone who knows how to ride / Without even falling off…”</em>
</p><p>As the strains of Ginuwine’s “Pony” echoed through the den, Jon wondered if Uncle Ned was rolling in his grave. A tolerant man, Ned Stark, but even he would’ve balked at a group of four scantily clad men shaking their asses in his beloved den. (Well, three scantily clad men, anyway; Sam was wearing <em>more</em> clothing than usual.) In Ned’s lifetime, the den had been reserved for Steelers games, bourbon, and quiet contemplation, none of which were in evidence now. He and Sam remembered those days, when Ned settled into his threadbare old recliner and yelled at the television, Arya or Bran or later Rickon in his lap. Now the recliner and the rest of the furniture was gone, parceled out among the Stark children or sold off, with only the imprints in the carpet to remind him of the family that used to gather there.</p><p>But, he reminded himself, the bare room was a perfect place to practice their routine. The neighbors would’ve complained of the noise at his and Bran’s apartment, and Sam hadn’t yet told Gilly what they were up to—or, indeed, committed to joining the act. At every juncture he’d railed against it, but he still turned up at meetings and practices, and Jon knew it was only a matter of time until he got over his reticence. Already he swayed in time to the music when Jon, Satin, and Daario practiced. Daario, now he’d been a real find. Tattooed, muscled, and cocky, he was everything women were supposed to want—right? Not Jon’s type, but Sansa’s roommate had squealed over his picture when Jon showed her. “I want his <em>babies</em>,” Jeyne gushed, ignoring his eye-roll. Then, like clockwork, there’d been the predictable blow-up with her on-again-off-again boyfriend Theon that evening. If Daario could incite such fireworks, he’d be a real moneymaker. Small matter that he had a… <em>fairly</em> short criminal record.</p><p>Satin, though… Satin was just as striking, but in a less obnoxious way, and he had the added benefit of not being a total bore to talk to. Since meeting a week ago, they’d chatted over text every day. First about the act, but that had turned into discussions about music, and later movies, until they were talking like old friends. Satin liked older films, black-and-white things meant to be watched through a haze of cigarette smoke, but he didn’t act like a dick when Jon wasn’t familiar with any of his favorites. He was just as happy to speculate about the MCU or discuss the real-world implications of shitty romantic comedies. If nothing else came out of this scheme, Jon was sure he’d found a lifelong friend in Satin. He was just so… <em>interesting</em>.</p><p>Most unfortunately, Bran thought so too. He was still adamant that his suggestion of a peep show had been a joke, so Jon suspected his continued interest in the project had more to do with Satin’s handsome face than anything else. It was summer and Bran was bored, a dangerous combination. Hardly a day went by that he didn’t come home with a head full of thoughts about some potential new conquest. That was all well and good, but couldn’t he pick someone his own age?? Was his little cousin so desperate he needed to go after Jon’s friends?</p><p>Preoccupied with this subject, rather than his routine, Jon missed a step<em>.</em> He lurched forward, stumbled past Daario, and caught the edge of the docking station with his foot, ejecting Bran’s phone and sending it flying into the wall. The doorframe careened into his line of vision, its unforgiving corners looming large. <em>Fuck!</em> He overcorrected and toppled to the floor with a heavy <em>whump</em>. <em>Well, that was dignified, </em>his subconscious chided.</p><p>“If the screen’s cracked, you owe me,” his cousin sang out, ignoring Jon’s gasp of pain. “Once you make some money off this sad little sideshow, that is.”</p><p>“I’ll add it to the list,” he said grimly, rubbing his wrist. He’d landed hard on his right hand. Rotating the joint sent pain shooting up his forearm. <em>But does Bran care? No,</em> he brooded. “Let’s… break for five minutes. No, Sam, I’m fine, you don’t need to help me up.”</p><p>Face still aflame, he turned his back and began to dress. Embarrassing, yes, but he’d bargained for that—they’d be in for plenty more when they had their footwork down and were ready to move on to the naked part. They’d decided to ease into it, get comfortable with peeling off their shirts and shorts first. If Sam would only stop fussing over his fall, he could’ve retained some dignity, but that was the way it was between them ever since Sam’s old injury. He’d been so tearfully grateful for Jon’s support during his rehab that he fretted like Grandma Lyarra if Jon got so much as a papercut. Thank god Bran had taken him out of doors for some fresh air.</p><p>Wincing, Jon pulled his jeans back on and tried to do them up with his left hand. The zipper glided up with ease, but even after his most strenuous efforts the button still eluded him. <em>How can this be so difficult, </em>he steamed, tugging pointlessly at his waistband. His left hand wasn’t dexterous enough to maneuver the button into place, and his right hand went numb when he rotated his wrist. <em>Damn clothing manufacturers!</em> What were people with limited range of motion supposed to do, or broken arms, or arthritis? Just give in and wear sweatpants forever?? Big Denim had a lot to answer for.</p><p>He was still struggling with the button closure when Satin sauntered over, now fully dressed and looking impeccable as always. (Daario, apparently, was content to wander around Jon’s old family home in his underwear.) “How’s the hand?” he asked, flexing his own. “You took quite a spill.”</p><p>“Fine, fine,” Jon dismissed. “It’s only a little stiff, it’ll work itself out.” It seemed too helpless to admit that he was having trouble buttoning his pants. He already felt at a disadvantage. Quite in contrast to Jon’s plain Hanes t-shirt and ratty old jeans, Satin looked like he’d been dressed by a personal stylist. How could he make a simple button-down look so good? <em>It’s the sex hair,</em> his subconscious answered without pause. He sighed. Maybe he was a <em>bit</em> jealous of that. His own curls went limp with the slightest hint of sweat, while Satin’s always kept their volume and stayed wild. What product was he using? Would it be weird to ask?</p><p>“You need any help with that?”</p><p>“Ah—what?” Satin’s voice jolted Jon back to the present, by which time he’d lost all track of the conversation. How long had he been pondering his friend’s hair care regime?</p><p>“Your button. Can’t get it?” He nodded tactfully at Jon’s jeans.</p><p>“No,” he confessed with a sigh. “Not with this hand. Oh well, these’ll just come off again, won’t they?” The laugh that came out of him sounded strained.</p><p>“If they don’t fall down on their own first. These things are hanging off you. When did you buy them, 2010?”</p><p>“I forget,” he lied. The pants <em>were</em> old… old enough that Aunt Cat had picked them out. Ygritte hated them, so of course he kept them out of spite. Usually it filled him with an evil sort of glee, to wear them when she wasn’t around, but for the first time he realized how stupid they made him look.</p><p>“You should try out some new things.” With a suddenness that made him suck in a breath, Satin plucked his button and guided it through the hole in the waistband. It was over before he knew it, done so deftly he felt only a slight tug around his hips. Jon’s heart pounded in his chest. He thought he felt something <em>else</em> in the vicinity of his waistband, as well, but rather lower. “There, all fixed. You should put some ice on that hand.”</p><p>“Yes… ice…” he whispered.</p><p> </p><p>A few minutes later, Jon stuck his head in the freezer, shamelessly glad that Bran and Sam had gone into the yard and left him alone. Daario was wandering the second floor, no doubt checking the walls for copper wiring. <em>Oh god. Did it move?? </em>He’d definitely felt <em>something</em> when Satin fixed his pants. Ever since the memorable Thanksgiving when Uncle Benjen had come out to the family and introduced his then-boyfriend in one fell swoop, Jon had suspected that <em>maaaaybe </em>he wasn’t 100% straight, but beyond a few fumbling experiments in college, the knowledge hadn’t been put into practice. The things he saw Benjen go through weren’t worth it, he thought. Besides, he was satisfied with women. He loved Ygritte, thought she was beautiful, enjoyed—<em>more</em> than enjoyed—sleeping with her. Sooner or later he’d get to do that again, once he’d cleaned up his act a little. Maybe he was just lonely. It’d been months since he’d last had sex, and he had to hear all about Bran’s antics—of course, he was just horny. Jon let out a relieved little puff of laughter, which turned to frost in the freezer. Satin was only being helpful. Stupid to get so worked up over it. Hell, he’d probably get hard if <em>anyone</em> came near his groin.</p><p><em>Well… maybe not Sam.</em> His oldest friend was trying to catch his eye through the patio door, beseeching Jon to come save him. The glass blocked most noise from the yard, but Bran’s mouth was moving, so he could understand Sam’s wiggling eyebrows and “help-me” expression. With a force that shook the whole fridge, he slammed the freezer door and went to Sam’s rescue.</p><p>“—and I’m of two minds about it,” Bran was saying as he slid the door open. A blast of heat hit him in the face. Jon felt his hair wilting. “On one hand, the revenue helps the school—”</p><p>“Hey,” he interrupted.</p><p>Sam wiped his brow, shoulders sagging with relief.</p><p>“We’re starting up again in two minutes,” Jon offered. “Soon as I corral Daario. He seemed a little <em>too</em> interested when I said the house was up for sale, didn’t he? Let’s turn on the security system when we leave.”</p><p>“Your funeral,” Bran moped, put out about being interrupted. “But if Cersei calls to bitch us out again when she sets off the alarm, I’m not answering.” Their real estate agent set off the alarm without fail each time she attempted to show the house, even after Sansa texted and e-mailed her the security code, then wrote it painstakingly on a Post-it and stuck it to the listing agreement. It was really Bran’s fault they were using her in the first place. He had insisted they hire his boyfriend’s mother, then broken up with Tommen before Cersei had even done the first showing. Now they were stuck with her, for at least 41 more days (and counting.)</p><p>“Sansa can deal with her,” he suggested with a hope he did not feel. “C’mon, let’s go back downstairs. You need to start learning the steps, Sam. Bran,” he ordered over his shoulder, “Go find Daario.” With any luck, his cousin would attach himself to him instead of Satin.</p><p>“Don’t tell me what to do,” he scowled.</p><p>“I’ve been dancing all afternoon, think you can climb a flight of stairs for me.” After a moment’s consideration, he added, “If you don’t, I’ll tell Sansa you’re the one who took all of the best bottles out of the liquor cabinet.”</p><p>Bran ascended the staircase, mumbling something about traitors who wouldn’t get to share any of the good Scotch.</p><p> </p><p>When Daario returned, Jon was almost glad for his state of undress, for it meant he hadn’t stolen anything—yet. Mentally he tallied what might be left in the house. Aunt Cat’s nice jewelry had been divided between Sansa and Arya months ago, all except for her wedding ring, set aside for Rickon to give Shireen one day; Uncle Ned’s golf clubs were claimed by his best friend Robert. Even Bran’s old coin collection had been sold off already. Still, there might be one or two old trinkets worth a few bucks up in the attic, or in Robb’s room. None of them had found the strength to go through his things yet. If Daario had taken advantage of that, stolen something of Robb’s… Jon did not realize he was clenching his fists until his injured hand started to complain. <em>He’s practically naked,</em> he assured himself, <em>he’s not hiding anything.</em> If Daario had gone to the trouble of hiding something in his underwear—or anywhere else on his person—Jon was not going to try and reclaim it.</p><p>Nothing seemed amiss with Satin, he was pleased to discover as they returned to the den. It did not appear that he’d given their little encounter a second thought. That, if nothing else, convinced him it had only been a friendly gesture. And if it was only a friendly gesture, he didn’t need to think about what it meant. “From the top,” he barked, clapping his hands. “Daario, let’s try you on the left this time—we keep running into each other, and I’m not in the mood to fall on my face again. Sam, stay over there and practice with us until you have the footwork down, then you’ll be on the other end next to Satin.”</p><p>Looking mutinous, Sam crossed his arms. “Haven’t agreed to this,” he muttered. “Just helping out. I never said I’d join you.”</p><p>Of all people, Daario came to Jon’s defense. “Why not? Too vanilla to try and expand your mind? Or do you just think you’re better than the likes of us? I say, if you can make a week’s money off an hour’s work, more’s the fool who passes the opportunity by.”</p><p>“No,” Sam grunted. “You three <em>can</em> make money off this. No one’s going to pay to watch me get naked.” He lowered his voice. “Don’t even make my wife do that.”</p><p>“C’mon, Sam,” Satin cajoled. “That’s no way to live. Grow a little more scruff and you could pass for a teddy bear-type. Lots of people like that!”</p><p>With thoughts of Uncle Ned still fresh in his mind, Jon felt compelled to add, “Remember my uncle’s friend Robert? He’s heavier, and <em>he</em> has no problem getting female attention. Women love him! If he’s comfortable with his appearance, no reason for you not to be.”</p><p>“Yeah, you’re much better looking than gross old Robert,” Bran chimed in. Jon looked his way, mildly surprised to find there was at least one person his cousin <em>wasn’t</em> attracted to. “Now, if we can all stop the negative body image talk. One, two, three, four..!”</p><p> </p><p>Whether it was their encouragement or finding that his old football moves translated quite well to dancing, Sam perked up. By the end of practice, he had joined them at last, bopping away next to Satin as if it had been his idea all along. Still fully dressed, of course, but they’d work on that. The rest of their sweaty clothing lay abandoned in this or that corner, crumpled in sad heaps. Bran’s suggestion to air out the den during their cool-down was well taken, no matter how muggy it was outside. All five of them breathed a sigh of relief when he heaved up the sash of first one, then two windows. “You stink,” he explained, wrinkling his nose.</p><p>“Nothing wrong with good, healthy sweat,” Daario argued, and took a deep sniff of his own armpit. “Makes me feel… alive!”</p><p>“Gross,” Bran observed lightly.</p><p>“Far from it, my man! Sweat is nature’s aphrodisiac. Gets the pheromones going. I go out to the club tonight, every woman is going to be begging to come home with me. Don’t run from your own funk. <em>Embrace</em> it.”</p><p>To Jon’s alarm, Bran’s face had grown pensive. He couldn’t <em>really</em> be considering Daario’s advice, could he?! Their apartment smelled bad enough already, between the mountains of laundry, crusty unwashed dinnerware, and Bran’s compost pile experiment on the balcony. If his cousin stopped bathing on top of that, Shireen would raise hell, not to mention Sansa.</p><p><em>Bzzzz. </em>Jon’s pocket was vibrating. Eager for the distraction, he stooped to pick up his jeans and checked the screen—a text from “Stain.” Inside was the Peter Parker and Miles Morales crouching meme, with a caption that read “Daario and Bran.” He stifled a giggle and texted back “Noooo!” A few seconds later, Satin’s phone went off. Jon kept watch out of the corner of his eye. Would he send something else back, or would that be it?</p><p>Sam cocked his head. “Do you guys hear something?”</p><p>“That’s just the sound of Tommen thanking God that Bran dumped him,” he cracked, but there <em>was</em> something. A purring sound, in the walls maybe… or outside. He listened harder. A slam, the crunch of gravel, then nothing, until… the tap-tap of high heels on the porch. A jingle of keys.</p><p>“Cersei!” he hissed, snatching up his jeans. “She’s not supposed to have any showings today, is she??”</p><p>“Not until Thursday,” Bran said, reassuring, but his eyebrows had knitted together.</p><p>“It IS Thursday!” Oh god, where was his shirt? He’d peeled it off and thrown it <em>somewhere</em>… A key slid smoothly into the lock. He could hear the deadbolt turning in the next room.</p><p>“Who’s Cersei?” asked Satin, brow creased with worry. “Another one of your cousins?” He’d gone after his very expensive-looking shirt first, Jon noticed, and was taking the appropriate care to turn it right side out.</p><p>“Realtor,” he muttered, casting his gaze about the room for his shoes. “We’re not supposed to be in the house anymore, but…”</p><p>“Is she going to call the police??” Sam squeaked.</p><p>“That’s stupid—” Bran’s sentence cut off at the sound of the front door swinging open.</p><p>“—all fixtures original to the house. I’ll be honest, I don’t think much of the former owners’ decorating choices, but the bones of the house are good. There’s hardwood floors under a lot of these carpets, you’ll find, and even a simple coat of paint would really spruce it up, bring the light in...” Cersei Lannister paused in front of the door to the den, mouth agape, a clipboard dangling limply from one manicured hand. For one moment of sheer astonishment, she just stared at the five men, and they stared back. A stern middle-aged couple peeked their heads around the doorframe.</p><p>Thinking fast, Daario whipped his sweaty shirt at the intruders. “RUN!” he barked.</p><p>That was the cue they needed. In perfect unison, Jon, Sam, Satin, Daario and Bran leapt into action and ran for the open windows. In one smooth athletic motion that belied his history of cross-country, Jon dove through the large bay window, doing a perfect tuck-and-roll as he hit the ground. This time, he didn’t suffer so much as a scrape. His cousin followed, less gracefully. Sam tried the second window, hoisting one leg over the sill, then the other as Daario hissed behind him. “Go, GO, just jump!” Jon heard him urging from inside the house.</p><p>“M’stuck,” Sam warbled, but he wasn’t really. There was a bit of a drop-off from the porch and he was anticipating a hard landing and possible further injury to his hamstring.</p><p>With a roar of impatience, Daario clapped his hands on Sam’s shoulders and pushed him out the window. A loud <em>flump</em> and an indignant “Hey!” from Sam. Daario’s foot came through the window and collided with the side of his head. Seeing no apparent damage to their friend, Bran hightailed it across the lawn, heading for a line of trees that marked the property boundary. “SANCTUARYYYY,” he yelled as he sprinted, his voice becoming a squeal as he got further away.</p><p>Next to where Jon lay on the parched grass, Satin opened the patio door and walked out. “Is this necessary?”</p><p>“GO, man, I’ve got a warrant!” Daario toppled out of the window, earning him a “serves you right,” from a disgruntled Sam. “I’ve got your wallets, she can’t identify us!”</p><p>Which was worse, Daario having his wallet or Cersei calling the cops, or, possibly, his cousin? None of those seemed attractive options. Nonetheless, he joined Daario in his jog across the lawn, Satin laughing and carefree behind him. Halfway across, he turned to take a look at the house. Through the open window he saw Cersei’s pale, pointed face goggling at them, her perfect coif mussed from where Daario’s shirt had caught it.</p><p>When they reached the neighboring property, Daario kept running—picked up speed, if anything—but Jon and Satin paused to rest with Bran on Aunt Cat’s memorial bench. He tried not to think about what his aunt would say if she knew he was sitting on it in his briefs. Sam brought up the rear, huffing and puffing dire admonitions. “Gotta—go—<em>now</em>,” he stressed, and bent over to rest his hands on his knees. “Calling—someone.”</p><p>After his initial panic, Bran had pulled himself together and now scoffed at Sam’s warning. “I’m partial owner, I have every right to be here, with whatever guests I choose. If the pigs show up, I’ll just tell them we’re having a quiet afternoon in until she rudely interrupted us.” At that moment, both his and Jon’s cell phones trilled an incoming message.</p><p>“Are you at the house??” demanded Sansa’s text. “Cersei just called and she is LIVID. She said she showed up with potential buyers to find you having an orgy in the basement?? Mrs. Dustin was so horrified she probably won’t make an offer on the house now!”</p><p>Then another: “I didn’t think either of you even had keys anymore!!”</p><p>“Let <em>me</em> handle this.” With that self-important statement, Bran scrunched his brow and pecked furiously away at his phone, composing a response the length (and probably style) of The Odyssey. Honestly, Jon was happy to let someone else handle a problem for once. He didn’t like to say it, but even the short run across the grass had left him slightly out of breath. Time to get back to the gym, expensive or no.</p><p>Satin tapped him on the shoulder, nodding at Bran. “Problems with Sansa?” he asked in an unnecessary undertone. Sam was too busy bemoaning the possible consequences of near-nudity to care about anything they were saying.</p><p>“Aw, she’ll be pissed, but she can’t prove anything.” Cersei had met Jon precisely once, and even then her eyes had skipped right over him, recognizing Sansa right away as the mouthpiece of the family. She couldn’t be trusted to remember him now, though she undoubtedly had an axe to grind with Bran. With any luck, his little cousin would do penance for this incident, and let Jon skate away scot-free. “I’ll buy her something pretty and she’ll forget it.”</p><p>“Must be nice,” Satin mused, stretching his legs. He leaned back against the bench and tipped his face up to catch the sun. Even in his state of partial undress he looked angelic, even more so than the engraving of Aunt Cat’s visage that adorned the back of the bench. It was a nice picture, taken from photo of her smiling down at newborn Rickon; but from this angle, it just looked like she was checking out Satin’s ass. Well, she’d always had good taste.</p><p>Jon forced himself to stop looking. “What’s nice?”</p><p>“To have a sister who’s so forgiving. Well, not sister, but you know what I mean. My own can hold a grudge for what seems like eternity.” Satin opened his eyes to peer at him. “She threw a Precious Moments figurine at me when I came out. Left a scar, see?” He flexed his arm. A thin line that he had never noticed before ran from mid-bicep to elbow. “Not because I’m gay, but because I upset Grandma. Nothing but ‘dios mío’ and the sign of the cross for weeks.”</p><p>“She’s gotten over it, then?” Now that his heart rate was slowing, he was curious to learn more about Satin’s family. He’d mentioned living in Florida, and that he didn’t speak to his father, but nothing else. Jon hadn’t even known he had a sibling.</p><p>“Diana, yes. Grandma never forgave me, just made big sad eyes at me all the time whenever she came around.” The look on his face put Jon’s own glower to shame. <em>Do I look like that when I’m grumpy?</em> Jon wondered. Then Satin shook himself out of it. “Oh well. That old bitch is dead, and I’m loving life! When I go home I’m going to visit her grave with a big bunch of roses and tell her about all the guys I fucked while I was away.”</p><p>The nastiness in his voice cooled Jon’s ardor fast. This was a side of Satin’s personality he hadn’t seen before, and it concerned him. He couldn’t imagine hating a member of his own family so much that he’d celebrate their death, even his creepy uncle Viserys. Although… Sam’s dad was pretty awful, and Gilly had thrown a literal party when her own father was denied his parole. With that in mind, he did his best to sound sympathetic. “Is your whole family that way? About your sexuality?”</p><p>“My father shared all his opinions with Grandma,” he said dismissively. “But Mom came around after a while. She even wanted to meet Pyp, before we broke up.”</p><p>This was the third time he’d mentioned the fabled Pyp, who sounded like a real asshole. Jon was about to say so when his phone buzzed again with Bran’s long-winded reply.</p><p>“I am well within my rights to reserve a key to a residence where I hold a quarter ownership! If Cersei had bothered to contact all of us instead of just you, I could’ve told her I scheduled a small gathering of friends and associates that would conflict with her precious appointment. We were just giving the family home a proper send-off with class and style when she barged in without so much as a knock. If she weren’t such an utter Philistine she would’ve realized that!”</p><p>A snicker from over his shoulder told him Satin was reading along. “Would your family consider stripping to ‘Pony’ a classy and stylish send-off?” he murmured. Jon felt the back of his neck getting hot. Wasn’t it supposed to be mild weather this evening?</p><p>“Absolutely not. Hang on, let me get myself out of this.” Working fast, he dashed off a quick reply to Sansa and Bran, pretending the latter was not sitting only five feet away from him.</p><p>“What the hell are you two talking about?” it read. “At Steward’s Bar with Sam, doing resumes. Bran, you’ll give me that key at home tonight.”</p><p> </p><p>Two streets away, Donella Hornwood, sunbathing in her backyard, yelped in surprise as Daario launched himself over the privacy fence. “Don’t mind me, babe,” he called out as he streaked past the pool. “Lookin’ fine, by the way!” With a flourish, he plucked the canvas cover from off her riding mower and wrapped it around his waist, then disappeared behind a hedge.</p><p>Smiling, Donella readjusted her sunglasses and wriggled contentedly in her deck chair. <em>Still got it.</em></p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I had so much fun writing this, particularly Daario's dialogue. Such a skeeze! Also enjoyed name-dropping Bobby B in this chapter since Mark Addy, of course, starred in The Full Monty. I couldn't resist putting in a nod to that, somewhere. I guess I should mention at this point that Robert and Cersei have never been married in this timeline, and don't even know each other. Tommen, Myrcella, and Joffrey are all Cersei's kids with her as-yet-undetermined husband.<br/>Ginuwine's Pony is a true masterpiece and I will not hear otherwise. I was supposed to see him perform at the Kentucky State Fair a few years ago, but got distracted by the animals and missed it. It was the same night Alabama was performing in a different part of the fairgrounds, a true cross-section of humanity if ever there was one. I saw someone wearing a cowboy hat and a pink blazer printed with Donald Trump's face. Was it a fever dream? I'm still not sure.<br/>So, next time, Sansa will be on the warpath and headed to Steward's Bar to track down Jon, having (correctly) determined that he and Bran are in this together. Whoever could she run into there, I wonder? ☺️</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Edd I</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Edd meets a pretty girl, and injures himself in the excitement. Later he considers an alternate source of income.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Which depraved, sadistic cockwomble of a human being had first started serving alcohol in fish bowls?? Which misguided bartender had first decided to allow it?? Did he enjoy pain? Or perhaps he was looking at it all wrong, and such a creature had never walked the earth as a man, but sprung fully-formed from the ninth circle of hell, right along with the biblical Judas and whoever was responsible for Microsoft Teams. The treachery was coming from inside the house! And he’d thought Roose’s dungeons were bad. He’d visited those several times, often as a cleric but occasionally as a wizard, and even his most devious inventions had nothing on the inventor of the alcoholic fishbowl. The damn things wouldn’t stack—he’d tried, in various configurations—and the shelving behind the bar was, put politely, inadequate for his needs. Steward’s Bar had been designed (in the loosest possible sense of the term) in the days when this part of town attracted old-man drunks and game day revelers, both content with the traditional pint glass, rather than roving gangs of bachelorettes seeking out the latest developments in vulgarity. Accordingly, pint glasses were about all they could accommodate, but Bowen had refused to listen to Edd’s suggestion to push drinks that could reasonably be consumed by a single human instead. And also accordingly, they’d lost two fishbowls in the last week—three, if he counted this one. Sighing, Edd went for the dustpan.</p><p>It was about 3 o’clock, too early for the influx of drunk students, which was just the way Edd liked it. As soon as he’d finished with the glassware from the night before he could have a nice sit and read his book uninterrupted. But now… picking glass out of the bar mat would take the rest of the afternoon if he did it right. For a moment he considered just leaving it for the night shift to deal with. Pea Eye and Gus had just taken shelter in a dugout along the river, Gus suffering from multiple leg wounds, and their dire circumstances made even his shift seem pleasant in comparison—but his book would still be there in an hour or so, wouldn’t it? And he didn’t want to listen to the crunch of glass underfoot all night.</p><p>With meticulous care, Edd picked shards of glass—or Pyrex, or whatever fishbowls were made of—from the bar mats for three-quarters of an hour, then went over them again with the vacuum cleaner attachment just to be sure. <em>Good enough to eat off of, </em>he thought, and allowed himself a moment of satisfaction in a job well done. <em>That’s why they pay me the medium bucks. </em>He put away the vacuum, gave the bar a final wipe-down with a paper towel, and victory-slammed it into the trash can—cutting his finger on a shard of glass in the process.</p><p>The wound had just about stopped oozing blood when he heard the bell over the front door tinkle, signaling his first customer of the day. Just in time for him to bleed in their drink! Fervently hoping whoever it was had only came in to ask directions, he turned, concealing his wounded hand, and—</p><p>Saw quite possibly the loveliest woman he had ever laid on eyes on. (Well, not <em>ever</em>, but certainly for the past few months.) Hair the color of autumn leaves, cheekbones sharp enough to cut his hand a second time, and legs as long as—well. Very long indeed. He swallowed. She was wearing the sort of light cotton dress you saw on every woman in the summertime but inhabited it like it had been sewn just for her, the fabric clinging to her body like a hug. The bright yellow floral print felt like the only light and color he’d seen all day. He’d never properly appreciated how nice yellow was.</p><p><em>Oh no, I might have been staring at her for a while,</em> he realized. Long enough for her to pull the door closed behind her and strut the length of the bar to where he was standing, holding his bloody hand and probably looking like a complete simpleton. How long were you supposed to look at someone?</p><p>“Are you all right?” The woman’s brow crinkled in concern.</p><p>“Yes, I mean, no. You startled me, is all. Don’t usually get customers this early in the afternoon. Unless, of course, it’s game day, and that’s not for several more weeks, unless you consider badminton a serious game, haha…” He heard his scratchy voice jabbering on and on about nothing in particular—badminton, seriously??—but he seemed completely unable to stop himself. The pretty lady’s eyes widened as he went on until she looked like an anime character. He wanted to join Pea Eye and Gus in their dugout. An arrow in the leg would be less painful than this sorry display.</p><p>“—and that’s why it’s called a shuttlecock,” he finished, staring at his feet. Oh, he’d never live this down. With his luck she’d probably fill out a nasty comment card.</p><p>“….Yes,” she murmured, sounding puzzled—he outright refused to look at her face again. “But I meant your hand. It’s bleeding.”</p><p>“Oh! Oh, that. It’s nothing.” Edd gave a careless wave of his hand, trying for cavalier disinterest, but only succeeded in spraying the bar with blood droplets. He dove for the roll of paper towels lying at his feet. “Just cut myself on a glass,” he shouted up at her, head bumping the cabinet.</p><p>If he’d hoped for a moment to regain his dignity, he was disappointed. The redheaded lady peered down at him over the bar, an anxious frown on her face, while Edd did his very best not to look at her cleavage. “Well, did you clean it?” she asked in a gentle, soothing voice meant for hospital bedsides and kindergarten classes <em>and definitely not pillow talk, Edd, now calm the fuck down. </em>“There’s not glass still in it, or grit..?”</p><p>“Oh no, it’s fine, I just swiped my finger against a corner. Hazard of the trade.” He straightened up and grinned. <em>That wasn’t so bad.</em> “You’re sweet to worry about me, but I just need to find the first aid kit.”</p><p>“Let me see.” Though he could think of no reason why this beautiful woman had time for his injured finger, he held out his hand, spine stiffening slightly when her fingers brushed his. His initial impression that she was a carer of some kind was further reinforced by how deftly she examined his cut, keeping a firm grip on his arm while wiping away the blood with a paper towel as gently as if he was a newborn kitten. “You’re right, it looks clean, but you should get a bandage on that as soon as possible. Should heal nicely, but… do you care about scarring?”</p><p>“Never minded a scar, miss, my mother says they give a man character.” <em>Whyyyy did I mention my mother,</em> he groaned internally. Had he de-aged thirty years when he wasn’t looking? Because he felt like awkward eighth-grade Edd again, trying and failing to ask Gillian to the harvest festival. Not that he wasn’t awkward now, but his age lent him a patina of “aloof” rather than “weird.”</p><p>But for some reason the lady was beaming back at him. “I think so, too. My brother’s girlfriend, she’s a sweet kid but she has a bit of scarring on her face, and people can be so cruel about it. Rickon doesn’t mind it at all, of course, he’s just glad the infection wasn’t worse, but some people… Oh, but I’m rambling, aren’t I? I forget, not everyone enjoys casual discussion of bacterial infections. Nursing school will do that to you.”</p><p><em>A nurse</em>. That made him like her even more, a dangerous prospect. “I take care of my mother, miss, and she’s bedridden, I’m afraid you can’t scare me with medical horror stories. Wait now while I get a bandage. And don’t rob me while I’m gone.”</p><p>When he emerged from Bowen’s office, a fresh Band-Aid around his finger, the lady was perched on a barstool, tapping away at her phone with one manicured fingernail. Evidently she had neither robbed him nor thought better of her visit. What brought a woman like that to his shitty little hole-in-the-wall bar on a Thursday afternoon, all by herself? Was she meeting someone? <em>A date?</em> That’d be it; any minute now some impossibly good-looking man her own age would muscle his way through the front door and sweep her off her feet with one arm. Probably tall, too, and he wouldn’t bleed on her or tell stories about his mother. Edd was beginning to dislike this mythical date of hers. “You’re still here,” he observed, by way of introduction.</p><p>“I am,” she agreed, distracted by her phone. “Just a minute—” And so she began a furious and silent text battle, firing off rapid messages one moment, scowling at the device in her hand the next. Maybe her date was late, or wanted to bring along someone else, or had a life-threatening accident on their way there, or had received a vision from the Virgin Mary saying they shouldn’t be together. All of those had happened to Edd’s dates before, or so they said. <em>Poor thing.</em>Maybe he should pour her a drink… but he had no idea what she liked. He snuck another quick look at her. Most women of her age and appearance would order a fruity cocktail, but a margarita seemed a little presumptuous. Perhaps just a fruity beer. <em>Besides,</em> he thought, sneering, <em>if she doesn’t like it, her date can always buy her something else.</em></p><p>She took the summer shandy from him automatically and gulped it down, leaving delicate lip prints on the frosty glass. Her eyes widened slightly and, attention wrested away from her phone at last, she went in for a second swallow with both hands.  “Refreshing,” she sighed, and closed her eyes in savor. “It’s so hot outside.” Edd allowed himself a brief moment of victory. Then her eyelids flew open and she looked at him warily. “Wait, I don’t remember ordering this.”</p><p>“On the house. Consider it payment for bandaging me up. Besides, you looked like you needed it.” <em>Ooof.</em></p><p>“Right?” The tinkle of her laugh was music to his ears. “It’s already been a long week, but I guess it’s not over yet.”</p><p><em>They’re all long weeks,</em> he thought, but the thought didn’t bother him for once. “What’s the trouble?” he asked, hoping he wasn’t pushing it too much.</p><p>One red eyebrow quirked in disbelief. “Do you really want to know? I wouldn’t want to keep you from your work with my babbling.”</p><p>“Because I’m so busy.” He gestured at the empty seats to the right and left of her.</p><p>“Well, all right.” Another sip as she ordered her thoughts. “I’m selling our family home and the realtor was supposed to be doing a showing today, but my brother and my cousin were up to something suspicious when she got there, so I’m trying to find out what. But they’re stymieing me at every turn. Jon said he was here with his friend Sam, not at the house at all, so now I know he’s lying, at least.”</p><p>Despite the welcome news that she was arguing with her brother, not a boyfriend, Edd’s stomach plummeted. Unless it was a different Jon and Sam, he had a very good idea of what they might have been up to. “Jon… Snow? And his friend Sam Tarly?”</p><p>“Yes!” Her half-full glass clacked against the bar as she thought better of another sip. “So they <em>were</em> here?”</p><p>“Not today, unless it was in the small hours. I just know them from work,” he explained, hoping she would not ask many questions. First Alliser had come after them, and now one of Jon’s fabled cousins, who he had never mentioned was so pretty. He ought to start charging for bounty hunting services.</p><p>“Oh, you were at Night’s Watch too, then? Nice that you found another job so fast. It wasn’t right what they did to you all, closing down so quickly like that.”</p><p>He shrugged. “Jobs never treat you right. Nothing new.”</p><p>“Isn’t that the truth,” she muttered. “To new opportunities!” She held her glass aloft in hopeful optimism.</p><p>Edd hastily poured himself a shot of whatever was nearest at hand. “New, if not exactly better,” he amended, and clinked it against her beer. The acid green hue of whatever he’d chosen for himself clashed vividly with the yellow of her dress. <em>The colors are trying to warn me, </em>he thought, rather like the spots on a poisonous frog<em>. </em>With deep misgivings he knocked it back, and only years of experience kept him from gagging. <em>I’m way too old for shots. And this girl, probably.</em></p><p>Only good manners kept her from laughing at him. “Apple schnapps? Seriously?”</p><p>“Won’t ever run out if no one drinks it,” he sputtered. “But god that’s awful. Ugh. Feel like I should lick sandpaper just to get rid of the taste.”</p><p>“Maybe there’s some in your first aid kit,” she suggested, eyes alight with mischief. “I’m Sansa, by the way.”</p><p>“Edd.” Thankfully she did not make any move to shake hands. His finger was still throbbing. “Want another one of those?”</p><p>“Oh no, it’s too early in the day. I’ll just finish this.” Sansa looked around as if expecting someone to swoop in and do it for her. “Ah—so does Jon often come in during the day? He told us he’d been job hunting. I assumed he was doing it at the career center, but…”</p><p>“No,” he said, but couldn’t think how to continue. If he was really putting together a—what did you call a group of strippers? A swarm? A gaggle? A convocation? Well, anyway, if Jon was really putting together one of those, he definitely wasn’t doing it at the career center. Fuck if he knew what he’d told his cousin he was doing instead. Choosing his words carefully, he said “He and Sam were here with some other people. Maybe a job interview. I heard them talking about, er, qualifications.” Qualifications to take off their clothes, anyway.</p><p>That must have been the right answer, because Sansa exhaled a sigh of relief. “Well, that’s something. I really hope he finds something soon… Aunt Lysa won’t lend him any more money, I’m sure of it.” Her gaze swept across the neat rows of alcohol behind him. “You couldn’t get him a job <em>here</em>, could you?”</p><p>“Barely got myself a job here.” It was only a matter of time before Bowen found out he did not have the ten years’ experience he’d claimed… unless you counted handing out beers at D&amp;D sessions.</p><p>Sansa awarded him a polite titter, and Edd’s stomach did something interesting and squirmy that had nothing to do with his recent blood loss. How come women like her never came in and roosted at the bar in the evening? Those loud, sparkly creatures frankly baffled him, and so he never tried to pick them up, no matter how much they might try and flirt for a free drink. Sansa was a refreshing, well-groomed sort of pretty, and so caring, to worry about her cousin. And she must be smart, too, if she was going into medicine. <em>If I was younger… </em>he thought, but banished the thought as quick as it came. Walda had been the catch of his life, and it was his own fault he’d gone and fucked that up. He wouldn’t be getting a second bite at the apple.</p><p>With rising distress, Edd watched her take the last swallow of her drink and push the glass back across the bar. Was that really going to be his exit line? A self-deprecating jab about his job history? Now she was guaranteed to stay away from the bar in future, even if, by some quirk of fate, it was the sort of place she liked to spend time. He had a feeling Sansa was not the sort of woman who tolerated poor service.</p><p>“Well, now that you’ve given me ammo to use against my cousin, I should be going. My real estate agent is furious. Better get the hysterics over with.” She stood, the last seconds of her company ticking away. “Thanks again for the drink. I’d leave you a nice tip, but…”</p><p>“No cash, right? Figures.” That had come out a bit harsh, to judge by her sudden stiffness.</p><p>“I didn’t mean—here, I’ll pay for it—” The tiniest purse he had ever seen appeared from somewhere down by her feet. He had a second to marvel at its whimsy—<em>I’ve seen burritos that were bigger than that</em>—before she was rummaging within. Instantly he felt like a total ass.</p><p>“No, don’t. Sorry, I was only trying to joke with you. My friends say they like my sense of humor. Kind lies, I imagine, but then they also like talk radio. Maybe I oughtn’t listen to them.” Edd listened to himself verbally dig his own grave with a detached fascination. Did people her age even know what the radio was?</p><p>“Let’s just say I owe you, for now. Next time I’m in I’ll tip double, ok?” The pout had not entirely cleared from her face. Somehow it made her even sexier. What was it about him that found pissed-off women so attractive? Was it some fundamental personal failing?</p><p>“I’ll hold you to that. What’s that saying? A bartender never forgets?”</p><p>“I think that’s elephants.”</p><p>“Well, my nose is on the long side. Close enough.”</p><p>She was polite enough to smile at this limp witticism. “What was your name again? Edd?”</p><p>“That’s the one.”</p><p>“I’ll tell Jon I met you… his former half-elephant co-worker. If he comes looking for a fight, you know who to blame.” Her skirt rippled cheerfully as she walked away.</p><p>Sighing, Edd rinsed her glass and wiped down the surface of the bar. So what if he’d failed to ask out the first woman he’d been attracted to in a long while. He always had the ladies in his book, and Lorena would never let him down.  </p><p> </p><p>After twenty minutes of reading and re-reading the same page, Edd gave it up as a useless endeavor. He felt the need to tell someone about the cute girl he’d just met, but most of his friends were married or in committed relationships. They’d want to toss all their single friends at him at the first mention of loneliness. No amount of wishing for companionship could make him endure another blind date with one of Howland’s friends. Maege had been tough as a bear and near as hairy—not that there was anything wrong with that, beauty standards being a social construct and all, but his personal preference was for women who shaved.</p><p>On a whim, he picked up his phone. Scrolled through his contacts. As suspected, Jon’s number was still there. They hadn’t talked in a while, but they’d always gotten on well, hadn’t they? Jon had been right by his side, convulsing with laughter, when he’d installed that annoying program on Alliser’s computer, and he hadn’t said a word about it to management. <em>I’m just warning him about Sansa, </em>he told himself, his thumb hovering over Jon’s number. <em>I’m definitely not looking for an excuse to meet her again. </em>Before he could change his mind, Edd dashed off a short text, hit send, and thrust his phone deep in his pocket. It was in the lap of the gods now.</p><p>He was washing another fishbowl when his phone buzzed. “Eddayyy! It’s been a minute. Wanted to say hi at the bar last week, but I didn’t want to go anywhere near Thorne. How’ve you been?”</p><p>Snickering, Edd typed out a reply. Alliser had been so convinced he was being sneaky, with his baseball cap and his gruff muttering, but of course Jon had seen right through it. Anyone who had worked for Thorne would know his surly voice and head of steel-wool curls anywhere.</p><p>“No worse than usual,” he typed back. “Though that’s not saying much. I wanted to let you know your cousin was just in, and she’s pretty irritated at you about something involving real estate—if you don’t mind, I’ll assume it’s over nothing less than arson, make my day more interesting. Thought you should know in case you want to get your story straight.”</p><p>Frustration rose from Jon’s next message, as clear and palpable as if he was in the room. “Damn! I never thought she’d go over there, sorry. What did you tell her?”</p><p>What <em>had</em> he told her? Not much, he thought. Slowly, he typed the message and read it over twice. “Said if you’d been here, I hadn’t seen you, but I just started my shift. And I didn’t mention anything about your ‘side business.’”</p><p>The wait for his next message was almost five minutes. “Yeah, thanks, that’s not going so well. That’s what we were doing at the house—practicing. The real estate agent came in when we were still getting dressed. 🍆🍆😱”</p><p>“I might be mad, too, if I saw Sam naked. Your secret is safe with me”</p><p>“I’ll have to tell Sansa at some point, anyway, if we want somewhere to practice. What’s she going to do about it, tell on me? 😈 She used to do ballet before she got too tall. Maybe she’ll even help us”</p><p>Sweating, Edd tried not to imagine Sansa in a leotard… or a tutu… or those strappy ballet slippers. He poured himself a drink of cold water. It was a moment before he realized Jon had double-texted.</p><p>“We are still looking for one more, though. Maybe we’ll see you again for more auditions, if you can handle it 😉”</p><p><em>Well. </em>He put his glass down. Here was an opportunity. With any luck he might run into Sansa again, without it being creepy, and maybe even earn a little extra to put towards a hospice for Mom, when the time came. Was he bold, or stupid, enough to do it?</p><p>“What’s the pay?”</p><p> </p><p>The house was dark when Edd got home around 10:30, and stank of eggs. His shoulders sagged with relief. <em>Good. </em>Eglantine from next door had stopped in to check on Mom, and fed her, by the smell of it. Eglantine’s dinners could barely be called cooking, but it hopefully it meant she had gone to sleep early and peacefully. Although… Sighing, he checked the fridge. Eglantine had left him a covered plate, too, with a note on top: “For Edd.” Well, obviously. He scraped the congealed omelet into the trash. The overhead light hummed its disapproval. Instead, he cracked open the cabinet and pulled down a bag of pita chips, an excellent pairing for his current mood. Pita chips: 8 regular servings, or one if you’re a lonely bachelor. Serve with hummus, escapist entertainment and just a hint of regret.</p><p>Tiptoeing to his room, he wondered if maybe he should turn around and grab some carrot sticks instead. One of his best qualities—perhaps his <em>only</em> good quality—was that he could eat all the junk he wanted and remain relatively trim. Walda, who swelled up with water weight if she ate so much as a pretzel, had hated that. Oh, it didn’t do his skin any favors, and one day his metabolism would revolt and he’d gain fifty pounds overnight, but he’d always dismissed that as a problem for future Edd. But if he was going to be naked in front of people, might be a good idea to start eating better now. There were areas that could use some… tightening up.</p><p>Thinking of Walda put him in the mood for a movie. <em>Evil Dead,</em> maybe, or <em>The Fly</em>… He’d almost made it past his mother’s room when he heard a faint rustling of sheets. Sometimes when he came home from work she’d pick up on his most minute noises, tossing fitfully until he went to his own room where it was quiet, but usually she didn’t wake if she’d had dinner. But it was so early still… He halted three steps before her door, pushed almost closed, a thin sliver of green light peeping out.</p><p>“Edd?” A thin, raspy voice, so quiet anyone else wouldn’t have heard it, issued from within. She sounded confused.</p><p>“It’s me,” he said softly, and pushed the door open. “Just got home from work. How are you feeling? Did Eglantine come by?” He made a show of setting down his chips, avoiding her eyes. In daytime his mother still seemed all right, mostly, just tired and worn, an older lady who might’ve pushed herself too hard. The machines and their noise could be relegated to the background when the sun was up. Now, though, the pinpricks of green light dyed the whole scene a sickly lime, the beeps loud and insistent. Rather than prolonging life, the medical equipment looked like alien life-forms feeding on her. He focused on the expanse of her old plaid nightgown, which she insisted she needed even in this heat. Her clothes were the only part that still looked like her.</p><p>“Oh yes, we watched Wheel and Jeopardy and had a nice talk. She was in a terrible state, she thinks her dog’s starting to lose his eyesight. Can’t take him to the dog park anymore because he can’t see where he’s going and gets lost. Oh, but her niece just started her first job! You remember Myrcella, she did the house-sitting that time when I was in New York with your brother—”</p><p>“Sure,” said Edd. He did not remember Myrcella at all.</p><p>“Well, she’s gotten a job,” his mother finished, with a determined jollity that would not have been out of place in a campaign speech. “Isn’t that nice?”</p><p>“Wonderful. Listen, I’m pretty tired, I might just eat a snack and crash. Do you want anything before I go to bed? Water? Is the room warm enough? Do you need the bathroom?”</p><p>“Oh, no, dear, Eglantine was kind enough to help me to the toilet before she left. We’re so blessed to live next door to her. One day when I’m feeling up to it, I’m going to bake some cookies and take them over. She loves those peanut butter ones with the chocolate kiss in the center.”</p><p>“I bet she’d like that,” Edd agreed, and they exchanged a painful smile. They both knew perfectly well that this cookie-baking dream would never happen. He reached out for her pillow. “Shall I?” Dutifully, she lifted her head and he turned it over, gave it a fluff, and nestled it beneath her once more.</p><p>“Ah, that’s nice and cool, thank you.” In turning to give him a good-night kiss, she spotted his bag of pita chips on the nightstand. “What’re you eating? Chips again? We left you a nice omelet—”</p><p>“Already ate it,” he lied, “I’m just starving.”</p><p>“Well,” she huffed, a little of her old energy returning. “I don’t know how you can eat that junk. Your father was the same way, he’d have cheese and crackers for every meal, but one day you’ll have to correct your diet or you’ll be in your grave before sixty like he was. What you need is a wife.”</p><p>“Please don’t talk about graves, Mom,” he said softly. “Besides, I tried to find a wife, didn’t I? Lost quite a bit of money in deposits, as you’ll recall, not to mention my dignity. Not quite ready to get back on that horse.”</p><p>“That’s no way to live,” she argued, but the fight had gone out of her. Even a brief squabble exhausted her these days. For a few seconds he longed for her to grab his ear, like she’d done when he was small, and drag him to time-out while lecturing him at top speed. Ah, just like old times. If only she could still do it. Instead, she looked up at him with her big sad eyes, tinted green in the subterranean gloom.</p><p>“Actually, I might have met someone today,” he improvised. Sansa was obviously a long shot, but he <em>had</em> met her, hadn’t he? Mom didn’t need to know it was a lost cause. “You’d like her. She’s a nurse.”</p><p>Her clawlike hands gripped his own with surprising strength. “Have you? Oh Edd, that’s <em>wonderful</em>. How’d you meet? What’s her name? When is she coming around?”</p><p>“Christ, Mom, I’m in my forties, not a teenager. You don’t need to vet her. Besides, it’s nothing serious.”</p><p>“Don’t take the Lord’s name in vain,” she lectured, and he smiled in spite of himself. Some things didn’t change.</p><p>“I’ll go blaspheme in my room, then. ‘Night, ma.”</p><p>“Goodnight, dear.” She paused. “Leave the chips.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Please excuse my unexplained two-month absence 🙃<br/>My OTP meets at last 🥳🥰 Edd could've made a better impression, eh? Poor dude. The Walda he refers to throughout the chapter is of course Fat Walda, although in the modern day I don't think anyone would dare call her that! We'll learn more about their relationship in future, but suffice to say she is his ex-fiancee.<br/>So, we've got 5/6 of the group together. Whenever might Alliser enter the picture? Ohoho you'll have to wait and see!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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